[Associated Press - Rome - 26 September]: Breaking ranks with allies reaching out to the Muslim world, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi on Wednesday said Western civilization is superior to Islam. He also said he hopes the West conquers Islamic civilization.

The conservative billionaire's remarks were instantly disavowed by more moderate politicians in Italy, who called them both ill-timed and offensive.

Berlusconi made the remarks, which were broadcast on Italian television, after talks in Berlin with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and Russian President Vladimir Putin on the crisis sparked by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States.

He told a news conference, "We must be aware of the superiority of our civilization, a system that has guaranteed well-being, respect for human rights and -- in contrast with Islamic countries _ respect for religious and political rights, a system that has as its values understandings of diversity and tolerance."

He also claimed Western civilization is superior because it "has at its core, as its greatest value, freedom, which is not the heritage of Islamic culture."

Berlusconi went on to say that he trusts "the West will continue to conquer peoples, like it conquered Communism," even if it means a confrontation with "another civilization, the Islamic one, stuck where it was 1,400 years ago."

His comments came as many Western leaders were taking pains to avoid antagonizing the Muslim world and forge a worldwide coalition against terrorism. President Bush, for example, met Wednesday with American Sikhs and Muslims at the White House and issued yet another appeal for religious tolerance.

The reaction in Italy to Berlusconi's comments was swift and sharp. They were denounced by a number of Italian politicians as irresponsible and inflammatory.

Piero Fassino, a prominent member of the center-left opposition, called the comment "mistaken and, above all, inopportune."

"We're in a very delicate phase in the life of the planet. We need to unite the world against terrorism. And one of the conditions is to unite religions, to have civilizations and cultures cooperate," said Fassino.

An outspoken businessman, Berlusconi has only limited foreign policy experience, despite a brief, previous turn as prime minister in 1994. The allies in his conservative coalition include the often xenophobic Northern League and the once neo-fascist National Alliance.

Italy is home to at least 500,000 Muslims, many of them immigrants from North Africa.

The prime minister plans to visit Washington soon for talks with Bush on the terrorism crisis. A member of NATO, Italy has pledged its full cooperation.

[New York Times, BERLIN, Sept. 26]: The Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, in a briefing for journalists, praised Western civilization today as superior to that of the Islamic world and urged Europe to "reconstitute itself on the basis of its Christian roots."

Mr. Berlusconi, here to discuss international cooperation against terrorism with the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin, and the German chancellor, Gerhard Schröder, gave vent to views likely to outrage Turkey and other Islamic allies of the West and infuriate antiglobalization protesters, besides.

As it designs a strategy against terrorism, Mr. Berlusconi said, the West should trust in the supremacy of its values.

"We should be confident of the superiority of our civilization, which consists of a value system that has given people widespread prosperity in those countries that embrace it, and guarantees respect for human rights and religion," Mr. Berlusconi said. "This respect certainly does not exist in Islamic countries."

The West "is bound to occidentalize and conquer new people," he said. "It has done it with the Communist world and part of the Islamic world, but unfortunately, a part of the Islamic world is 1,400 years behind. From this point of view, we must be conscious of the strength and force of our civilization."

Mr. Berlusconi, who has been criticized for the force Italian police used against antiglobalization protesters in Genoa in July, said he saw "a singular coincidence" between the protesters and the terrorists who attacked New York and Washington.

The terrorists were trying "to stop the corrupting effect of Western civilization on the Islamic world," he said, while "the antiglobalization movement criticizes from within Western civilization the Western way of life, trying to make Western civilization feel guilty."

Mr. Berlusconi was speaking in an on-the-record briefing to Italian journalists covering his visit here. Some of the comments were then reported on the Italian wire service ANSA, and others were later relayed in full by an Italian journalist for Corriere della Sera who was at the briefing.

Later, in a joint news conference with Mr. Schröder, Mr. Berlusconi spoke highly of Mr. Putin and his cooperation on terrorism in solidarity with the United States. Like Mr. Schröder on Tuesday, Mr. Berlusconi soft-pedaled criticism over Moscow's human-rights abuses in the rebellious province of Chechnya, which has been fighting Russia for independence off and on since the time of the American Civil War.

On Tuesday, Mr. Putin gave a well- received speech in German to the German Parliament, in which he asserted that the Chechen rebellion was also a prime example of Islamic fundamentalism and terrorism and asked for a better understanding of Russia's predicament there. The West's new shyness to discuss human-rights abuses in Chechnya appears to be the price of Russia's new alliance with Washington and NATO against terrorism.