EU questions Berlusconis law
Publish date: 21 October 2004
Issue Number: 1200
Diary: Legalbrief Today
Category: Labour
A senior adviser to the European Court of Justice has found that parts of law that allowed Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to escape trial over alleged accounting fraud ran counter to EU legislation and should not be applied in the Italian courts.
Such opinions by the court\'s advisers, or advocates-general, are closely watched because judges normally follow their reasoning. A formal court ruling, reports the Financial Times, is expected within three to six months. The law in question was one of the first and most controversial measures passed by Berlusconi\'s centre-right government after it came to power in June 2001. It softened punishments for certain types of corporate false accounting and made it more difficult to prosecute such offences by shortening the statute of limitations that covers them. Berlusconi is still facing trial for allegedly bribing judges. Full report in the Financial Times
