Berlusconi corruption trial adjourned

A court in Milan yesterday adjourned for a month the trial of Silvio Berlusconi accused of corrupting his former tax lawyer, as the Italian prime minister pursued efforts to get the judges off his back.

Berlusconi, who did not attend the hearing, is on trial for allegedly paying €440,000 to British tax lawyer David Mills in exchange for false testimony during two trials in the mid-1990s.

Mills' parallel trial for the same crime was thrown out by Italy's appeals court last Thursday because the statute of limitations had expired, even though judges decided the crime had taken place.

Italian law sets a 10-year limit for prosecution of judiciary corruption crimes and terms for Berlusconi's trial are set to expire in the spring of 2011.

Berlusconi's lawyers yesterday asked the court to suspend the trial until details on the Mills ruling were published, but judges refused because "the trial cannot be suspended for an undetermined amount of time".

The prime minister launched a fresh attack on the country's judges last Friday, likening them to Afghanistan's Taliban and accusing them of using the judiciary for political purposes.

Citing ongoing reforms to the justice system which critics say are designed to make him harder to prosecute, Berlusconi remarked: "I don't think it will please the Taliban in the judiciary."

The secretary of Italy's magistrates' union Giuseppe Cascini replied, saying that "this escalations of insults and attacks against Italian magistrates is intolerable".

Italy's President Giorgio Napolitano yesterday called on the prime minister and the magistrates to tone down the "very serious accusations" which fuel "dangerous tensions" between branches of government.

Thousands of Italians congregated yesterday in Piazza del Popolo in central Rome to protest against Berlusconi under a banner reading "Enough. The law is the same for everyone."

Berlusconi's battles with the law have marked his public life since he burst on to the political scene in the mid-1990s. The media tycoon has faced charges including corruption, tax fraud, false accounting and illegally financing political parties.