Berlusconi scandal
October 4, 2009
Italians protested in central Rome on Saturday, demanding that Silvio Berlusconi stop trying to silence the media. Critics accuse the Italian prime minister of trying to control information surrounding allegations he entertained prostitutes at his private residence.
The prime minister has issued writs for a combined four million euros ($5.8 million) against two of the country's newspapers, La Repubblica and L'Unita, and he is suing newspapers in Spain and France. Berlusconi has also called on businessmen not to place advertisements in publications that have criticized him.
Saturday's protesters wore t-shirts and held banners with slogans such as "Sue me, too" and "Berlusconi is bad for Italy's health."
"We ask the prime minister to stop the campaign of accusations against journalists and to tell the truth," Franco Siddi, the head of the Italian Press Federation, told the demonstrators.
Berlusconi says he is the victim of a smear campaign and has called journalists who have criticised him "anti-Italian." He called Saturday's demonstration a "farce."
ca/AP/AFP/Reuters
Editor: Nigel Tandy