"'I am a segregationist. By segregation I believe no intermingling"
KKK Imperial Wizard found 30 years after he fled the US fleeing prosecution
A former Imperial Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan who now lives in Belize, alongside the very race of people he fought to segregate, has told Daily Mail Online: 'I don't hate blacks
Ain't that something?'
Breaking his 30-year silence Bill Wilkinson once the most powerful white supremacist in the world - hit back at claims he is a racist.
Speaking from the sun-drenched hotel resort he owns and where Daily Mail Online tracked him down, Wilkinson said: 'Don't call me racist, I don't hate blacks.
'I never have hated blacks, I still don't hate blacks, I don't hate anyone.'
But in a baffling contradiction Wilkinson added that he had not 'changed' since his KKK days.
He said: 'I'm just a Bible-crashing segregationist. I still believe in segregation, that's how it should be.
'God has commanded me not to mix with other races.
'I have not changed, I'm the same man I always have been.
'I wouldn't let one [a black person] marry my children or my grandchildren.'
Wilkinson owns a multi-millionaire dollar holiday resort in San Pedro on the island of Amergris Caye, living alongside the island's majority black population the same race of people he fought to segregate in the 1970s and 80s.
Yesterday Daily Mail Online revealed that he had been discovered. In the wake of the disclosure, he took Daily Mail Online on a tour of his hometown of San Pedro, to 'show how I am with the blacks'.
The 72-year-old who served as Imperial Wizard of the Invisible Empire of the Knights of the KKK from 1975 to 1984 - reveals he is now 'happy' living among the island's mostly Black, Mayan and Hispanic population.
Wilkinson said: 'Life is real good, I love the island, it's full of very friendly people.
'I enjoy scuba diving, that's what I came here for, snorkeling, fishing.
'People here know about my past but they don't care, they accept me for who I am.'
Astonishingly Wilkinson who runs the Seven Seas Resort in the popular tourist destination says he doesn't believe he is 'mixing' with other races by living in Belize.
He said: 'I would get asked similar questions during the 70s and 80s.
When it was pointed out to him that many people will be mystified as to why a former Imperial Wizard would decide to live among a black population in Central America, he laughed and said: 'Ain't that something? I don't hate 'em [black people].'
When our reporter pointed out the fact that his toxic views are reviled by the majority of right-minded people around the world, he replied: 'You'd be surprised.'
Wilkinson openly admitted he was friendly with the local black population and reveled in giving us the grand tour.
'Blacks, Rastafarians, Hispanics, you should see me with them,' he said.
The Daily Mail Online witnessed Wilkinson seemingly at ease greeting black men and women he said were his friends.
He laughed, joked, hugged and kissed several locals black men and women whom he admitted he once marched against.
The hotel owner seems almost thrilled at the bizarre acceptance he has achieved in San Pedro.
'Some of them (black people) shout from across the street and make the shape of a Klan hood on their head,' he says, 'but they do it with a smile.'
He added: 'That doesn't mean I would let my children or grandchildren marry em'.
Greeting another black woman he knows in town, he said: 'What's up gorgeous?'
After a friendly encounter, he said afterwards: 'Do you have any doubts she knows who I am?'
On the tour he introduced us to a penniless Rastafarian street artist called Kurt who called Wilkinson 'Mr Bill' and said he is his friend.
'I used to be in a wheelchair and when I met Mr Bill he gave me a cigarette and some money,' said Kurt.
'I don't like to ask people about their past. He's a good person, we mess with each other.'
Wilkinson fist-bumped the man and gave him a Gatorade to quench his thirst and seemingly enjoyed their shared humor.
But he became unhappy when our reporter began to detail to Kurt some of his old friend's more extreme racist views.