Citizen Silvio

The stained dossier of Berlusconi 

Italy's leader has seen off investigators and charges alike 

Rory Carroll in Rome
Tuesday May 15, 2001
The Guardian 

When Silvio Berlusconi plays host to the leaders of the Group of Seven
leading industrial countries in Genoa in July, his guests will be wondering
whether the event can match his last international summit for drama. 
Mr Berlusconi was Italy's freshly minted prime minister in 1994 when world
leaders trekked to Naples for a United Nations conference on organised
crime. They were followed in the door by an indictment from magistrates
charging their host with corruption. His famed smile faltered. 
In Genoa, Mr Berlusconi will get a chance at redemption on the world stage
thanks to Italy holding the rotating G7 presidency. Given his legal tangles
the subjects look topical: promoting democracy and fighting poverty. 
The leader of the world's sixth largest industrialised economy has been
accused of degrading democracy by standing for office after amassing a
controversial £9bn fortune and influencing public opinion through a media
empire that includes three of the main Italian television stations. 
The man that George Bush, Tony Blair and Gerhard Schröder will queue to
greet has been accused of money-laundering, tax evasion, bribery and
complicity with the Mafia. On three of these corruption related charges he
was convicted; the verdicts were later quashed on technicalities. Four
separate charges are pending. 
France's foreign minister, Hubert Védrine, said yesterday that Europe would
be keeping a "vigilant" eye on Mr Berlusconi's actions in office. 
A prominent investigating magistrate in Spain is among those who already has
his eye on the Italian leader. Baltasar Garzon wants the European parliament
to lift the media magnate's immunity as an MEP to facilitate an inquiry into
the financial affairs of a Spanish television station, Telecinco, which he
partly owned. 
The nightmare scenario for Mr Berlusconi is that he would be arrested on his
next visit to Spain. Mr Garzon would have the nerve. It was he who tried to
extradite Chile's former dictator, Augusto Pinochet, from Britain. 
Another battlefront could be London's libel courts if Italy's next prime
minister follows up his threat to sue the Economist magazine for its recent
issue detailing his alleged crimes. 
Convictions
He is accused of building his empire through a web of corruption spanning 30
years. His holding company, Fininvest, has stakes in television, financial
services, publishing, football and property. 
Despite three convictions he has not set foot in jail. Under Italy's
snail-pace appeals system, two of these convictions - for illegal party
financing and bribery - were extinguished under the statute of limitations.
A conviction for false accounting was overturned on appeal. 
Four separate charges - for false accounting, bribing judges, tax fraud and
breaking anti-trust laws - are pending. 
Mr Berlusconi, 64, vehemently denies all the accusations and says he has
been the victim of a witch-hunt by leftwing magistrates. His business career
has been a model of square dealing, he insists. 
In the 1960s the bank clerk's son entered Milan's booming property market by
developing a garden city east of the city. Its value increased after
aircraft from Linate airport were inexplicably diverted. Around £11m in
funding for the project came from companies in Switzerland. The Bank of
Italy suspected Mr Berlusconi was the real owner of these companies, in
breach of a law against holding capital abroad without notifying
authorities. 
The finance police decided against legal proceedings. Their investigator,
Massimo Berruti, left the force to work for Mr Berlusconi as a lawyer. He is
a now an MP for his party, Forza Italia. 
In the early 1980s money flowing into Mr Berlusconi's new television empire
is alleged to have come from the Mafia. The Bank of Italy investigated in
1997 and its report, according to the Economist, showed Fininvest to be a
secretive web of 22 companies funnelling money in circles for no apparent
reason. 
One company, Palina, had blank books and was fronted by a 75-year-old stroke
victim. Bettino Craxi, leader of the Socialist party and prime minister in
the 1980s, signed a decree consolidating Mr Berlusconi's virtual monopoly in
private television. Between 1991 and 1992 a part of Fininvest, called All
Iberian, allegedly paid £7m into Craxi's offshore bank accounts. Craxi died
last year in Tunisia, a fugitive from corruption charges. 
Mr Berlusconi was convicted of illegal party financing and sentenced to 28
months' jail. He appealed and the conviction was extinguished under the
statute of limitations. 
Mafia claims
Mr Berlusconi was also charged with paying £140,000 in 1991 to an appeal
court judge, Vittorio Metta, to clinch a battle for ownership of Italy's
largest publishing group, Mondadori. Cesare Previti, a friend and defence
minister in the 1994 Berlusconi government, was charged too. A court threw
out the case last summer, citing lack of evidence. Prosecutors have
appealed. 
In 1986 Mr Berlusconi is alleged to have bribed judges to block the takeover
of a food conglomerate, SME, by a business rival, Carlo De Benedetti. He
faces charges in connection with this allegation as well. 
Mafia supergrasses - mobsters who collaborated with prosecutors - claimed in
1996 that Mr Berlusconi and his friend Marcello Dell'Utri were in direct
contact with a Cosa Nostra boss. Two investigations were dropped due to
insufficient evidence. 
A trial is underway in which Mr Dell'Utri, a Fininvest executive who
co-founded the Forza Italia party with Mr Berlusconi, is charged with aiding
and abetting the Mafia. 
Mr Dell'Utri arranged for a convicted mafioso, Vittorio Mangano, to work in
the stables of Mr Berlusconi's Milan estate for two years in the 1970s.
Mangano's real job is alleged to have been to deter kidnappers from
targeting the tycoon's children.