President Hugo Chávez threatened to stop selling oil to European countries over a controversial new migration law on Thursday, leading to dismissals by European Union leaders on Friday that he had failed to understand the law.

Mr Chávez, who also threatened to kick European companies out of Venezuela, said that rules making it possible to detain illegal immigrants for up to 18 months and face re-entry bans of up to five years showed “signs of fascism”.

“Venezuelan oil will not go to the countries that apply this shameful directive,” said Mr Chávez, who has never carried out repeated threats to suspend oil shipments to the US, by far its largest customer.

Janez Jansa, Slovenia’s prime minister, whose country holds the EU presidency, said Mr Chávez’s threat was “perhaps exaggerated and perhaps not really understanding” of what the new laws meant.

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