Silvio Berlusconi's scandal-haunted political career has suffered a potentially killing blow: following his conviction for tax fraud, the upper house of the Italian parliament has tossed him out, stripping him of his seat. Berlusconi insists that he will be exonerated by new evidence, and has called upon the president of Italy to pardon him (though he will not formally petition for a pardon, insisting that it should be forthcoming as a matter of course). Assuming the pardon is not forthcoming, he will go to prison in 2014.
See also: Berlusconi's "decadenza"
"Today they are toasting because they can take an adversary, they say a friend, in front of the executioner's squad," Berlusconi said. "It is the day they have been waiting for for 20 years."
He pledged to continue his role as a political leader, citing other figures not in Parliament, namely the founder of the M5S, Beppe Grillo, and Matteo Renzi of the Democratic Party, tipped by many as a future premier candidate.
"Also, from outside the Parliament, we can continue to fight for our liberty," he said….
He is expected to begin serving his sentence next year for the tax fraud conviction, which related to a complex system of illegally inflated invoices at his Mediaset television empire. But this is not the end of his legal woes. Among other matters, he has been ordered to stand trial on charges of bribing a senator in an attempt to bring down Romano Prodi's government, and is appealing against a first-grade conviction handed down in June for having sex with an underage girl and abusing his office to cover it up. He denies the allegations in both cases.
Silvio Berlusconi ousted from Italian parliament after tax fraud conviction [Lizzy Davies/The Guardian]
(via MeFi)
(Image: berlusconi, a Creative Commons Attribution (2.0) image from spiritolibero85's photostream)
