SILVIO BERLUSCONI has defended a Fascist salute given by Paolo Di Canio, the controversial captain of Lazio and former West Ham United player.

The Italian Prime Minister, whose centre-right coalition faces a tough re-election battle in April, also suggested that Fascism was not as bad as Nazism or Communism.

Di Canio, 37, was fined €10,000 (£6,800) this week and banned for one game after making the straight-armed salute to Lazio supporters during a match against Juventus last weekend. His gesture — the third such incident this year — was widely condemned by politicians, players, fans and Jewish groups.

However, Signor Berlusconi said that the player had been misunderstood. “Di Canio is an exhibitionist,” he said. “His salute had no significance — he’s a bravo ragazzo [good lad].”

Jewish groups in Italy have threatened to take Di Canio to court. Fascist symbols are banned by the postwar Italian Constitution. Sepp Blatter, the President of Fifa, the world governing body of football, said that players who make the salute should be banned for life.

Di Canio, who missed Lazio’s match against Lecce yesterday, said that his salute was not political and that he would continue to make it for “my people”. Hardline Lazio fans, known as ultras, espouse far-right views, and Di Canio has the word Dux — an apparent reference to Benito Mussolini, the wartime Duce — tattooed on his arm. Di Canio’s career includes stints with Celtic, Sheffield Wednesday, Charlton Athletic and 4½ years with West Ham. He also made the salute in a Lazio match with AS Roma in January and against Livorno last week.

Signor Berlusconi was speaking during a Christmas lunch for foreign correspondents based in Rome. He said that Mussolini’s rule had never amounted to a criminal doctrine. The Fascist era was marred by the “indelible stain” of the race laws that persecuted Italian Jews, but Mussolini had acted less out of conviction than out of a desire to appease Adolf Hitler, his ally.

Signor Berlusconi also said that Western governments could not play by the rules to defeat Islamic terrorism. Italian magistrates are seeking the extradition of 22 CIA agents suspected of kidnapping Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr, an imam known as Abu Omar, on a street in Milan and flying him to Egypt for interrogation and torture under US “extraordinary rendition” procedures.

“I don’t think there is any basis to the case,” Signor Berlusconi said. “When hundreds of thousands of lives are at risk, countries have to use the secret methods . . . available to them to defend those lives . . . You cannot tackle terrorism with the lawbook in your hand. If they fight with a sword, you have to defend yourself with a sword.”