Italy’s former PM Silvio Berlusconi dead at 86
Italy‘s former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has died aged 86.
The billionaire businessman created Italy’s largest media company before transforming the country’s political landscape.
He was admitted to San Raffaele hospital in Milan on Friday for medical checks, sources said last week. Italian media reports initially reported on his death this morning, with Reuters news agency confirming the news with two sources.
The billionaire media tycoon – who was in a relationship with 33-year-old Forza Italia MP Marta Fascina – was discharged from hospital last month after treatment for a lung infection linked to a Chronic Myelomonocytic Leukaemia (CML).
Berlusconi’s health markedly deteriorated in recent years, with open-heart surgery in 2016 and numerous hospital admissions since contracting Covid-19 three years ago.
He was admitted to intensive care in April in the cardiac unit of the San Raffaele hospital after suffering from breathing problems.
Italy ‘s former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi had died aged 86, Italian media reports have claimed. Pictured: The last known photo of Berlusconi, taken as he left the San Raffaele hospital after a 45-day of hospitalisation, in Milan, northern Italy, 19 May 2023
Former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi has been admitted at San Raffaele hospital in Milan, four sources told Reuters today
While there, Berlusconi, the leader of the Right-wing Forza Italia party, was diagnosed with a lung infection and CML – a rare blood cancer characterised by high numbers of white blood cells.
He was discharged on May 19 after 45 days in hospital.
Berlusconi had previously overcome prostate cancer, which he described as ‘a nightmare lasting months’.
But it was his battle with Covid in 2020 which he described as the ‘most dangerous challenge’ of his life.
The three-time prime minister of Italy, who was embroiled in several scandals – most notably around his ‘bunga bunga’ parties – was admitted to hospital with a minor heart problem after fainting in 2006, and underwent heart surgery in a US hospital in January 2007.
The former AC Milan owner, who also had major heart surgery in 2016 to replace an aortic valve, has had a pacemaker for several years.
He was hospitalised again for a reported urinary tract infection in January 2022.
Berlusconi, who won a seat in Italy’s Senate during general elections in September, stirred controversy in recent months with his criticism of Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky, putting him at odds with Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni.
The billionaire, whose Forza Italia party is part of the ruling government coalition, was accused – but acquitted this year – of paying young starlets and others for ‘silence and lies’ about his notoriously hedonistic soirees, which he has always insisted were elegant dinners.
The verdict was the culmination of a legal battle which began in 2010 when Berlusconi, then prime minister, was accused of abusing his power to protect a young Moroccan nightclub dancer, Karima El-Mahroug.
Berlusconi, who had five children, was temporarily banned from political office after a conviction for tax fraud in 2013, for which he served a community sentence.
But he returned to the political front lines and was re-elected as a senator last year.
The media mogul, who first entered politics in 1994, did not have a role in Italy’s government at the time of his death.
