President of the European Parliament, Antonio Tajani, is facing widespread criticism after Italian media reported he had said in an interview that Italian wartime fascist dictator Benito Mussolini did “good things for Italy.”

Italian media reported that Tajani, speaking on an Italian radio show “La Zanzara,” said that the Italian wartime dictator had done positive things to realise infrastructure in the country, “until he declared war against the whole world following Hitler, until he promoted racial laws, apart from the dramatic event of Matteotti,” Politico reported.

Giacomo Matteotti, an Italian socialist politician, was killed by the fascists in mid-1920s after openly accusing them of committing fraud and using intimidation tactics to gain votes in the 1924 general election which resulted in a landslide victory for Mussolini’s National List.

Tajani continued, explaining: “We must be objective. I’m not a fascist, I’ve never been a fascist and I don’t share his political mindset, but if we’re being fair, he had built roads, bridges, buildings, he returned many parts of our Italy to us. The wrong things were Matteotti, racial laws, the war. Those were unacceptable.”

Tajani is member of the centre-right party Forza Italia, which is part of the European People’s Party group in the European Parliament. He has served as President of the European Parliament since January 2017.

The response from his European colleagues was swift. Udo Bullmann, leader of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats group (S&D) in the European Parliament, said on Twitter Tajani’s words were “unbelievable.”

“How can a President of the European Parliament fail to acknowledge the nature of fascism? We need swift clarification,” he wrote.

Later on Wednesday, Tajani rejected all criticism on Twitter.

“Shame on those who manipulate what I’ve allegedly said on fascism. I’ve always been a convinced anti-fascist, I will not allow anyone to suggest otherwise. The fascist dictatorship, racial laws and deaths it caused are the darkest page in Italian and European history,” he wrote.

Croatian officials condemned the statement as well.

Croatian MEP Biljana Borzan, member of the centre-left Social Democratic Party (SDP) from the S&D group, tweeted: “EP President, your statement that Mussolini did some “good things” is shameful! As the statement about “Italian Istria and Dalmatia”, this is unworthy of your position. This shows revisionism is your ideology and your “apology” was a sham!”

MEP Tonino Picula, also member of the SDP, tweeted: “EP President Antonio Tajani’s recent invocation of ‘Italian Istria and Dalmatia’ is clearly not an isolated incident, but a political platform. ‘Mussolini has made some positive things,’ he told Radio 24. Among other things, ‘he regained many parts of our Italy.’”

This is the second time in two months that Tajani’s words have caused an uproar. Last month, while attending a commemoration for the Italian victims of the foibe at the Basovizza pit near the Italian town of Trieste, Tajani said: “Long live Trieste, long live Italian Istria, long live Italian Dalmatia,” Italian media reported.

The statement caused outrage in Croatia and Slovenia, with officials of both countries calling it an example of historical revisionism. Tajani later said his words were misinterpreted, and that it was not his intention to offend anyone.

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