Berlusconi accuses magistrates of politicising latest sex scandal

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi yesterday charged that an enquiry launched by Milan magistrates into his relationship with an underage girl was politically motivated.

“There’s been no graft, no incitement to prostitution, not even of a minor,” Mr Berlusconi said in a television address on SKY Italia.

The Prime Minister’s comments came as Milan magistrates launched an enquiry into allegations Mr Berlusconi hooked up with prostitutes he kept in rent-free luxury apartments and that he had sex with an underage prostitute.

While paying for sex with prostitutes is not a crime in Italy, having sex with an underage prostitute has been punishable with a prison sentence since Mr Berlusconi’s right-wing government voted in a law against it in 2006.

The Prime Minister denounced a “new, very serious attack on the part of the magistrates who have trampled on the laws for political ends” and “want to use the affair as a political weapon.”

Milan prosecutor’s office announced the investigation last Friday, just a day after a top court ruling partially stripped the Prime Minister of political immunity.

Prosecutors have demanded Mr Berlusconi submit to interrogation this month, but the Prime Minister has dismissed the idea. “My lawyers said that as the Milan tribunal is not qualified (to judge this case) it’s not logical for me to go.”

Mr Berlusconi said the magistrates had tried to undermine him politically, and accused them of “violating basic constitutional principles” such as the right to a private life by wiretapping on guests who attended his parties.

The Prime Minister said the magistrates had used highly sophisticated technology to spy on his guests, “as if they had to carry out a raid against the Mafia.”

In published wire taps of conversations with friends, Ruby, a Moroccan whose real name is Karima El Mahroug, said she had asked Mr Berlusconi for five million euros compensation for having sullied her name. Allegations that the Prime Minister hand-picked prostitutes for wild parties and paid to have sex with the underage girl, known as Ruby, left Italy reeling this week and sparked fierce criticism from the Church and opposition parties. But Mr Berlusconi, a notorious womaniser, has always claimed he never paid for sex and both he and Ruby, who is now 18, have denied having improper relations.

Mr Berlusconi late Tuesday dismissed the allegations as a “media construction” and said he had no intention of resigning. “Are you mad?” he retorted when questioned by journalists. “I’m having fun!”

The prosecutors hope to search the offices of Mr Berlusconi’s trusted sidekick Giuseppe Spinelli, who manages the Prime Minister’s Fininvest holdings and is suspected of handling money for Berlusconi’s prostitutes, even unwittingly.

Mr Spinelli, whose offices are considered part of Mr Berlusconi’s domain, described the scandal as exaggerated and said cash payments and apartments loaned to the girls involved were merely acts of charity towards women in need.

“It’s much more simple than it seems. We help people who have problems. I understand that anyone not involved in the situation cannot know. They have no idea how many people we’ve helped,” he said in a RAI television interview.

Actress Sabina Began, nicknamed “Queen Bee” by the media for allegedly ruling over the other girls at Mr Berlusconi’s parties, said the Prime Minister would help anyone.

“Young, old, ugly and hunchbacked: he likes to give,” she told SKY Italia.