An Italian junior minister said she had quit Saturday in protest at Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's complaint to US President Barack Obama about his legal woes. Berlusconi, who has a long history of legal troubles and is currently on trial for having sex with an underage prostitute, told a visibly uncomfortable Obama on Thursday there was "a dictatorship of left-wing judges" in Italy.
Daniela Melchiorre, a qualified magistrate herself, whose small Liberal Democrat party only recently joined Berlusconi's centre-right coalition, said "enough is enough." "It's unacceptable to descend to such vulgarity and try to discredit a constitutional function to one of the most important authorities on the planet," she said. Italian commentators had ridiculed Berlusconi's antics on the international stage of the G8 summit in France after he walked over to Obama at the start of a roundtable discussion on global issues, put his arm over the US president's chair and began chatting.
"I have had 31 trials against me and I've always been acquitted," Berlusconi told Obama, according to a lip-reading analysis of video footage. Berlusconi has had some initial convictions but many cases against him have expired under a statute of limitations or he has been acquitted on appeal.
The 74-year-old premier, who regularly complains he is a victim of plots by a left-wing judiciary, is currently a defendant in three trials in Milan. Melchiorre, who had the title of state secretary for economic development, admitted that all was not right with the Italian legal system, but said the country's priorities were elsewhere, particularly in boosting the economy.
Her resignation comes ahead of crucial run-offs in local elections on Sunday and Monday, notably in Milan, Berlusconi's home town, where leftist candidate Giuliano Pisapia is tipped to snatch the mayoralty from the incumbent Letizia Moratti of Berlusconi's People of Freedom party.
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