Ghaddafi pays 500 Italian babes to listen to attempt to convert to Islam

Independent:

The mysterious host asked the Italian hospitality agency for "500 attractive girls between 18 and 35 years of age, at least 1.7 metre high", and if the women who answered the call were in the dark about their duties, they must have felt confident that the event would be an interesting one.

As it turned out, they were right – but not, perhaps, in a way they might have expected. The host was none other than Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. Miniskirts and plunging necklines were forbidden. And the purpose of the gathering was to convert them to Islam.

The eccentric Libyan leader was in Rome for the World Food Summit, but apparently his interest in the event's famine relief programme was matched by his determination that Italy's most glamorous hostesses be fired with religious zeal. Reports in the Italian press relate how soon after the dictator's arrival in the Italian capital, Gaddafi's aides had contacted an agency that supplies attractive young women as hospitality. They were asked to come to the home of Hafed Gaddur, the Libyan ambassador in Rome over three evenings this week, beginning on Sunday.

The girls had to be pretty, but given the pious motivation for the event, miniskirts and plunging necklines were forbidden. At the first of the sessions, Gaddafi appeared, after a typically diva-like late arrival. Dressed all in black, he sat in the middle of a "sumptuous drawing room", and began the lesson.

His all-female staff distributed gift copies of the Koran to the participants, according to Paolo Lo Mele, a reporter from Ansa news agency, who sneaked in, posing as a hostess.

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Col. Weird strikes out. The guy seems to be beyond embarrassment. Personally you could not pay men to attend an event with that guy.