Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi on Wednesday dismissed months of allegations about his sex life as “all lies” as he prepared to host the Group of Eight summit in central Italy.
“They are all lies, from the underage girls onward,” Berlusconi told a news conference when he was asked whether the scandals that have been dogging him since April would cloud the summit starting on Thursday.
The questioner was from the left-leaning daily La Repubblica, which has made a steady stream of allegations beginning with an unexplained relationship between the Italian leader and a 17-year-old aspiring model whose coming-of-age party he attended.
“My (G8) colleagues know the newspapers well and know how to judge them,” Berlusconi said, dismissing a report in the London Guardian quoting unnamed senior Western officials as describing planning for the summit as “chaotic.”
“It was a colossal blunder by a small newspaper,” Berlusconi said.
The flamboyant billionaire’s relationship with teenager Noemi Letizia was the last straw for his estranged second wife Veronica Lario, who has filed for divorce.
That scandal was compounded when explicit photographs emerged of scantily clad guests cavorting at Berlusconi’s luxury villa in Sardinia and an investigation into whether the prime minister entertained call girls at his parties.
{{/usCountry}}That scandal was compounded when explicit photographs emerged of scantily clad guests cavorting at Berlusconi’s luxury villa in Sardinia and an investigation into whether the prime minister entertained call girls at his parties.
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