Even George Clooney and Cristiano Ronaldo have somehow got caught up, writes PADDY AGNEWin Rome
“La Minetti was also at Berlusconi’s house, with her tits out and kissing him all the time. I mean, listen, the place is a total bordello … I thought it was a straightforward dinner… on the contrary, she called me up about it … she was horrified at what she saw, all of them half-dressed, in just their knickers and half-drunk too with Berlusconi wrapped around them and he was kissing them all, touching them all and there were maybe 20 of them, including Minetti, and of course those particular two, because you know who stayed behind to f*** with him, with Berlusconi? The two De Vivo twins … ”
The above is an extract from a dossier sent to parliament in February by the Milan magistrates who have have charged Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi with “exploitation of underage prostitution” and “abuse of office” in relation to the so-called “Rubygate” sex scandal.
The speaker is former prefect Carlo Ferrigno and his account of an alleged “bunga bunga” night at the prime minister’s private residence of Arcore, outside Milan, is, in turn, based on the description of that night given to him by belly dancer Maria Makdoum.
Needless to say, when the Rubygate trial opens in Milan next Wednesday, the prosecution and the defence will be offering radically different interpretations of the infamous dinner parties/bunga bunga nights at the prime minister’s private residences.
Were these evenings, as the prime minister claims, “elegant and sober” dinner parties? Or were they, as the prosecution will attempt to prove, evenings where a variety of good-looking, young and ambitious women were induced to prostitute themselves with “Sultan” Berlusconi?
Above all, is it true that the then 17-year-old Moroccan Karima “Ruby” El Mahroug spent 13 nights at Arcore last spring, nights during which she had sex with the prime minister? The charge relative to “underage prostitution” is linked entirely to the person of “Ruby”, a 17-year-old runaway who is the key witness in this trial.
The other major accusation against Mr Berlusconi, who almost certainly will not be in court on Wednesday, is that last May he told a huge lie when he pressurised Milan police to release Ruby, then being held on theft charges.
A July 28th police report claims the prime minister’s office contacted police chief of staff Pietro Ostuni to inform him Ruby was a relative of deposed Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak and therefore should “not be detained” for fear of a serious diplomatic incident with Egypt.
The prime minister’s defence will argue Mr Berlusconi was acting in good faith since he genuinely believed her to be a relative of Mr Mubarak. Among the 78 witnesses called by the defence team this week, there are four cabinet ministers, including foreign minister Franco Frattini. It is believed Mr Frattini will give evidence of a conversation between Mr Mubarak and Mr Berlusconi during an Italy-Egypt meeting last summer when Berlusconi mentioned he had met a “relation” of Mr Mubarak.
That witness list also includes both American movie idol George Clooney and Real Madrid football star Cristiano Ronaldo, summoned by the defence in what looks like an attempt to prove (1) the respectability of the Arcore dinner parties (one of which Clooney allegedly attended) and (2) the unreliability of Ruby, who has claimed Ronaldo paid €4,000 for a night of sex. While Ronaldo has denied Ruby’s claims, Clooney seems to have distanced himself from Mr Berlusconi, saying he met him only once, in relation to aid to Darfur.
In the end, however, the three women judges who will preside over Rubygate may decide that neither of these “famous” witnesses is really relevant. Critically, those judges will have to decide what to make of key witness Ruby. Is she telling the truth now when she says that she never had sex with the prime minister? Or is the following wire tap in fact the real truth when she says: “Silvio calls me all the time. He told me to pretend that I am mad … and just make up stories … with my lawyer, we’ve asked him for €5 million … in return for pretending to be mad.”