CANBERRA - Prime Minister John Howard has been confronted with questions about why his government refused to let US rap star Snoop Dogg into Australia during a visit to a Canberra school yesterday.
The federal government blocked Snoop from entering Australia last month because of his recent convictionin the US on gun and drugs charges - the latest in a series of offences on an extensive rap sheet.
Mr Howard yesterday compared the Snoop case to that of holocaust denier David Irving, repeating comments he made when the hip hop star was denied a visa to enter the country for the MTV Australia Music Video Awards.
Mr Howard told a teenage student at the school that Snoop, whose real name is Cordozar Calvin Broadus Jr, was a man of poor character.
"I just think we have to take a stand on those issues," he said.
Mr Howard told the student the former Labor government had made a similar stand when Irving tried to visit Australia.
In 1994 Irving tried to enter Australia to promote a book which denied the existence of gas chambers at the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland during World War II.
His claims caused an international outrage.
Snoop was barred from the United Kingdom following a fracas at Heathrow Airport last year.
The 35-year-old rapper was warned when he visited Australia in February this year that any further indiscretions would make it difficult for him to perform in the country.
Then, on April 11, he pleaded no contest to charges of gun possession by a felon and sale or transportation of marijuana.
He was sentenced to five years' probation and 800 hours of community service.
The charges came after he was arrested at Los Angeles' Bob Hope Airport last October on suspicion of transporting marijuana.
