Silvio Berlusconi, one of the most scandalous and notorious people in modern Italy, has died.
Perhaps it is difficult to find a more scandalous politician in modern Europe than Silvio Berlusconi. In 1987, the prime minister, media tycoon, owner of football clubs, defendant in numerous corruption scandals and organizer of famous orgies died four times. Western media wrote that he left a mark on Italy that no leader has left since Benito Mussolini’s fascist dictatorship. Athletistic recalls the biography of the scandalous Italian.
There are many criminal cases
Silvio Berlusconi has been a suspect in at least 60 different cases: embezzlement, tax evasion, making false financial statements and attempting to bribe a judge.
In some cases, the case went to court, but Berlusconi was either found not guilty, or the verdict was overturned on appeal, for example. In some cases, the judges were unable to make a decision because the statute of limitations had expired.
Luck turned against Berlusconi in 2013, when he was found guilty of tax evasion, sentenced to four years in prison and expelled from the Senate. Just because of his age, the prison sentence was commuted to one year of community service.
Berlusconi was also sentenced to a seven-year term on charges of sexual relations with a minor Karima Mahroug, also known as Ruby, and abuse of office while trying to free her from the police.
Berlusconi denied paying for sex and explained that he wanted to help the woman find a job because she told “a story that touched him.” According to Mahroug, he received 7,000 euros from the prime minister. The girl also denied that she had a sexual relationship with Berlusconi.
Berlusconi did not go to prison – his lawyers obtained a full acquittal. On July 18, 2014, the Milan Court of Appeal overturned all sentences imposed due to insufficient evidence and lack of corpus delicti.
Shortly thereafter, Milan prosecutors launched an investigation against Berlusconi on suspicion of bribing participants in the controversial “bunga bunga” party at a villa in Arcore to testify in Ruby’s case.
Information about the parties was revealed in the first trial thanks to published telephone conversations. According to prosecutors, party guests and invited girls had sex. Many of those invited are up-and-coming TV presenters.
Special relationship with Putin
In more than two decades of Vladimir Putin’s stay in the Kremlin, he has never developed such a friendship with any Western politician as with Berlusconi. When they met in July 2001 at the G8 summit in Genoa, they were immediately filled with personal sympathy for each other. In the first year and a half after that, the Italian and Russian leaders met eight times.
The media reported that in August 2003, Putin’s children were vacationing at Berlusconi’s villa Certosa in Sardinia. The Russian president himself spent three days there and called the villa “a chic place.” Berlusconi made several informal visits to Russia for Putin’s birthdays.
Berlusconi has repeatedly spoken out in support of the Kremlin in Chechnya, human rights, Georgia and Ukraine, criticizing the West for this. A US diplomatic cable published by WikiLeaks said that the Italian prime minister tried at all costs to be in Putin’s favor and often expressed opinions that Putin proposed directly to him, because he admired machismo, strong will and authoritarian style of the latter.
In November 2011, on the eve of Berlusconi’s resignation, Putin called him one of the last Mohicans of European politics, and in 2015 a friend and ally.
In 2013, Putin, arriving in Rome on a state visit, first visited Berlusconi’s villa, and then only went to Prime Minister Enrico Letta.
Words about Ukraine
In 2014, Berlusconi said he sympathized with the separatists’ proclamation of “people’s republics” in eastern Ukraine.
“As for Ukraine, I strongly disagree with the policies of the European Union and the United States. The inhabitants of Crimea speak Russian, they voted in a referendum to join their mother Russia. The imposition of punishment is the wrong political decision,” he said a year later.
On September 11, 2015, Berlusconi, while vacationing with Putin in Sochi, joined him in annexed Sevastopol. The Security Service of Ukraine banned him from entering the country for three years.
After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the politician made many loud and controversial statements.
In April 2022, two months after the start of the war, he said that he was disappointed and saddened by the actions of Vladimir Putin. A month later, he said that Europe should “try to force the Ukrainians to accept the proposals of the Russian president.”
Before the elections in September 2022, Berlusconi said that the Russian president “wants to replace the government of Volodymyr Zelensky with worthy people,” but the Russian troops encountered unexpected resistance from the Ukrainians.
In early 2023, commenting on the meeting between Italian Prime Minister Giorgi Meloni and Zelensky in Brussels, Silvio Berlusconi said that he himself would not meet with the Ukrainian president and accused him of starting the conflict.
These words provoked anger both in Kyiv and in Rome. Berlusconi’s words were retracted both by his own Forward Italy party and the prime minister’s office. Because of this, the politician himself had to justify himself.
“We have always supported the Ukrainian people, we have always voted both in Italy and in Europe for helping Ukraine both by funding and providing weapons. I have always been on the side of the Ukrainian people and the world. I am in favor of a early diplomatic solution, because this war poses a threat to everyone,” he wrote on social networks.
Source: korrespondent
I am David Wyatt, a professional writer and journalist for Buna Times. I specialize in the world section of news coverage, where I bring to light stories and issues that affect us globally. As a graduate of Journalism, I have always had the passion to spread knowledge through writing.