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Critics say justice reform made to save Berlusconi
Fri Nov 13, 2009 10:27am EST
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By Philip Pullella
ROME (Reuters) - Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi says his government's justice reform plan will benefit all Italians but critics say it is just the latest in a string of tailor-made laws to help him avoid corruption trials.
The draft law, which was presented by Berlusconi allies in the Senate on Thursday, calls for one of the most radical reforms of Italy's snail-paced justice system since the end of World War Two.
It would impose a total six-year limit on the three stages of court cases -- initial trial, first appeal and final appeal -- in a country where trials can last more than a decade.
"This is not a tailor-made law. It is a law that affects everyone," said Gaetano Pecorella, a parliamentarian of the governing center-right People of Freedom bloc who is also one of Berlusconi's lawyers.
But the opposition, magistrates and consumer advocacy groups say it is yet another "ad personam" law, using the Latin term meaning "for a person."
"What it all boils down to is impunity for Berlusconi," the left-leaning La Repubblica newspaper said in an editorial.
Pierferdinando Casini, leader of the centrist Union of Christian Democrats who was a partner with Berlusconi in a previous government and who Berlusconi has been trying to woo back to his side, dismissed the law as "a pile of rubbish."
If the law is passed in its current form, which commentators say is likely because the center right has a comfortable majority in both houses of parliament, two of Berlusconi's current trials will be declared extinct.
One is a trial against him on charges of false accounting in the acquisition of TV rights by his Mediaset television empire.
Another is a case in which he is accused of bribing British lawyer David Mills to give false testimony in 1997 to protect Berlusconi's business interests.
Berlusconi denies any wrongdoing.
BERLUSCONI BACK IN THE DOCK?
Berlusconi was to have returned to the dock in those cases and others after Italy's highest court ruled last month that his immunity from prosecution while in office -- guaranteed by a law passed by his government -- was unconstitutional.
After that ruling, Berlusconi demanded that his allies close ranks and come up with a way to protect him from magistrates he says are "communists" who are bent on destroying him.
The center-left opposition has vowed to fight the law, which is expected to be the rallying cry of a national anti-Berlusconi demonstration planned for December 5 in Rome. Continued...
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