By IANS,
London : The editor of a leading Italian newspaper dubbed “subversive” by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has defended its series of exposures about alleged sex scandals involving the Italian leader, saying it had become a political issue.
“You can imagine in your country, what would happened if [British Prime Minister] Gordon Brown met some escorts in his house and one of those escorts used a tape recorder and took pictures,” Ezio Mauro, Editor of La Repubblica, told The Times in an interview published Friday.
“This is an embarrassing situation but the embarrassment is not private, it is political,” said Mauro.
“It was Berlusconi who chose this story, not our newspaper. Berlusconi chose the stage, he chose the actors and actresses.
“Above all he told lies, and the lies of the powerful pose questions for journalists,” Mauro added.
His comments came after another newspaper, the leftwing L’Espresso, Thursday published the transcript of a tape allegedly containing an intimate conversation between Berlusconi and Patrizia D’Addario, an escort.
The owners of La Repubblica are suing Berlusconi after he described the newspaper as “subversive” last month while urging Italian entrepreneurs not to advertise in it.