UK Independence Party (UKIP) leader Nigel Farage said Friday that protesters who mobbed him in Edinburgh were “deeply racist” and “akin to fascism”.
Protesters chanting “racist Nazi scum” filled a pub near the Scottish parliament where Farage was due to give a press conference Thursday evening, forcing police to barricade him in until he could be rescued in a riot van.
Two people were arrested.
Farage told BBC radio’s Good Morning Scotland: “The idea that UKIP is some kind of horrible, nasty, anti-immigrant, racist party is not something that was evident to the rest of the country, but of course that wasn’t what it was all about.”
Asserting that the protesters were Scottish nationalists, he added: “It was a demonstration dressed up as being anti-racism but in fact in itself was deeply racist, with a total hatred of the English and a desire for Scotland to be independent from Westminster…
“I must say I have heard before that there are some parts of Scottish nationalism that are akin to fascism but yesterday I saw that face-to-face.”
When the BBC’s interviewer questioned the link between the Scottish independence movement and racism, Farage declared: “I’ve had enough of this interview. Goodbye,” and hung up.
He later called on Alex Salmond, leader of the pro-independence Scottish National Party (SNP), to condemn the protest, while saying he did not believe the SNP leadership were implicated.
UKIP, founded on a platform of euroscepticism, broke through as a major political force in England earlier this month following local elections that delivered a bloody nose to Britain’s ruling coalition.
The party describes itself as “non-racist” and lists a crackdown on immigration among its policies.
Farage was in Scotland to promote the party’s candidate in a Scottish Parliament by-election in Aberdeen Donside.
An SNP spokesman said Farage had “lost the plot”, while a spokesman for pro-independence campaign group Yes Scotland said it was not involved in the protest and condemns all forms of intimidation.
Scotland is to hold a referendum in 2014 on independence from Britain.
Farage calls Edinburgh protesters 'deeply racist'
