http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article356694.ece48 hours that could condemn Berlusconi - and David Mills
He has passed laws to protect himself and his business, and blurred his interests with the nation's. But that could change.
By Peter Popham in Rome
There's a lot more at stake in today's Italian elections than the supply of free wristwatches and holidays in Sardinia to Tony and Cherie Blair.
This is judgement day on one person above all: the country's Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi. Polling continues tomorrow, and not long after the polls close at 3pm it will become clear whether Italy's richest man wins a new mandate or loses everything: the power and prestige of high office, his monopoly control of Italian television and, conceivably, his freedom.
He's not the only one. If Mr Berlusconi, Tony Blair's closest European ally, goes down, then a large metal door could also be clanging behind his erstwhile associate, David Mills, estranged husband of the Culture Secretary, Tessa Jowell. The pair are accused of conspiring to obstruct the course of justice at a trial which has its first hearing next month.
After a month off the agenda, the affair has suddenly bounced back into the headlines with the Italian leader denouncing the prosecutors behind the case in Milan as "shameless and infamous", producing 15 folders of documents. The prosecutors say Mr Berlusconi paid Mr Mills $600,000 (£345,000) to give false testimony in an earlier trial. The Prime Minister claims the documents prove that the money came from a different person altogether: Diego Attanasio, a Neopolitan ship-owner.
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