London, England - The spiritual leader of the Anglican church, Rowan Williams, warned it was "racist to whip up" anxiety over immigration, as political parties campaigned for elections expected in May.
The remarks by the archbishop of Canterbury on BBC television come after the main opposition Conservative Party put up posters around the country declaring: "It's not racist to impose limits on immigration."
Conservative leader Michael Howard has called for parliament to impose an annual limit on the number of people allowed into the country.
Asked if controlling immigration was racist, Williams told BBC2's Newsnight: "It's racist to whip up the kind of anxiety that can be so easily generated on this subject.
"That will always present asylum seekers, for example, as a menace, as an uncontrollable menace," Williams said.
Fear is a "button that can be pushed", the archbishop warned. "It's something that's an easy thing to reach for. There's bound to be some apprehension if people feel that all the things they care for are under threat and this is a convenient scapegoat very often.
"But in fact we have quite a good record of integrating people," Williams said.
"We have people with skills coming in. So I think that's an issue we have to move on from."
When asked if his remarks were an attack on the Conservatives, Williams, whose church represents 70 million people in Britain and other countries, replied that he thought "it's a cross-party problem."
He also said he believed it was his job to intervene in politics when there were issues of morality.
Britain's political parties are competing hard to address public concerns about immigration as the campaign heats up for general elections widely expected on May 5.
Howard on Tuesday unveiled a plan for a new border police force, stressing the need to protect Britain's shores from illegal immigrants and asylum seekers due to the "real terrorist threat" they pose.
In February, the Conservative party promised to test immigrants from outside the European Union (EU) for HIV, tuberculosis and other diseases if it wins elections expected in May.
The ruling Labour Party dismissed the plan as an attempt to catch up with the government's own immigration policy, while groups fighting HIV/AIDS condemned it as both ineffective and prejudicial.