Berlusconi Aide 'struck Deal With Mafia'

One of the closest aides to Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister, promised to help the mafia resolve its judicial problems in exchange for electoral support, a supergrass told a court yesterday.

Antonino Giuffre, a senior mafia boss who turned state's evidence after his arrest last April, spoke over a video link from a secret location.

He told the court in Palermo that the mafia had decided to switch its support to Mr Berlusconi's Forza Italia party in 1993 after the discredited Christian Democrats proved incapable of protecting it from a judicial onslaught.

Mr Giuffre said one of the people responsible for negotiating the deal between the mafia and Forza Italia was Marcello Dell'Utri, a former business associate of the prime minister and one of the founders of his party.

Mr Dell'Utri, a Sicilian-born Forza Italia senator, is on trial for alleged collusion with the mafia.

He denies committing any offence, saying he is a victim of a politically motivated persecution by magistrates and unreliable testimony by venal supergrasses.

The mafia showed its intention to switch political horses in March 1992, when it ordered the murder of Salvo Lima, a Sicilian Christian Democrat closely linked to the former prime minister Giulio Andreotti, Mr Giuffre said.

Andreotti is also on trial for alleged collusion with the mafia and has been convicted of ordering the murder of a journalist.

"The Lima murder marks the end of an era," Mr Giuffre told the court. "A new era opens with a new political force on the horizon which provided the guarantees that the Christian Democrats were no longer able to deliver. To be clear, that party was Forza Italia."

Mr Giuffre, known as Manuzza "(the Hand) because his right hand is immobilised by polio, is considered one of the most significant supergrasses to emerge for years. He was once a top aide to the "boss of bosses" Bernardo Provenzano.

He said the mafia had been in contact with members of Mr Berlusconi's Fininvest company to negotiate the terms of its political support.

It received assurances that the party would rein in the po lice, soften jail conditions for mafiosi and change laws giving incentives to supergrasses and providing for the confiscation of mafia property.

"The person who showed a particular interest in these issues was Mr Marcello Dell'Utri," he said.

He continued: "We started to encourage a new generation of politicians to come forward and become candidates for Forza Italia."

The organisation also undertook to abandon its direct assault on the state - manifested in 1992 and 1993 by the killing of anti-mafia magistrates - in order not to embarrass its new political ally. "It was very important that Cosa Nostra embarked on a period of tranquillity," said Mr Giuffre.

The supergrass said Mr Provenzano had promised that the mafia's practical problems would be resolved within 10 years, thanks to the undertakings given by Forza Italia. That period elapses this year.

In return, the mafia had drummed up electoral support for the party, most recently in the 2001 general election.

Observers said the testimony was the most detailed and politically embarrassing to Forza Italia in the five years that Mr Dell'Utri has been on trial.