Nigerian Nobel Laureate says England is a 'cesspit of Islamists'

London, Feb.2 (ANI): Nigerian Nobel Laureate political activist Wole Soyinka has described England as a "cesspit" and breeding ground for fundamentalist Muslims.

In an interview, according to the Guardian, he also accused Britain of allowing the existence of "indoctrination schools".

His extraordinary attack on what he views as Britain's part in fuelling Islamist terrorism was published on the US news and opinion website The Daily Beast.

It was coupled with his assertion that the 1989 fatwa issued by Ayatollah Khomeini against Salman Rushdie meant that the assumption of power over life and death had passed "to every ­inconsequential Muslim in the world".

Soyinka, the first African to win the Nobel prize for literature in 1986, made his claims in response to a question about his homeland of Nigeria being added to the watch list of countries deemed to be incubating terrorists, after the failed attempts of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to bring an airliner down over the US on Christmas Day.

"That was an irrational, knee-jerk reaction by the Americans. The man did not get radicalised in Nigeria. It happened in England, where he went to university.

England is a cesspit. England is the breeding ground of fundamentalist Muslims.

Its social logic is to allow all religions to preach openly. But this is illogic, because none of the other religions preach apocalyptic violence," Soyinka said.

He adds: "And yet England allows it. Remember, that country was the breeding ground for communism, too. Karl Marx did all his work in libraries there ..."

Soyinka added: "This is part of the character of Great Britain. Colonialism bred an innate arrogance, but when you undertake that sort of imperial adventure, that arrogance gives way to a feeling of accommodativeness. You take pride in your openness." (ANI)