Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, a billionaire businessman who created Italy’s largest media company before transforming the political landscape, has died aged 86.
Berlusconi had been suffering from leukaemia “for some time” and had recently developed a lung infection.
He died at the San Raffaele Hospital in Milan, according to Italian media.
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He had suffered over the years from heart ailments and prostate cancer and was also taken to hospital after a COVID-19 infection in 2020.
Berlusconi’s Forza Italia party is part of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s right-wing coalition, and although he himself did not have a role in government, his death is likely to destabilise Italian politics in the coming months.
Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has died in Milan aged 86. Credit: AP
Italian Defence Minister Guido Crosetto said Berlusconi’s death leaves a “huge void” because he was a great man.
“I loved him very much. Farewell Silvio,” Crosetto wrote on Twitter.
The Milan-born politician’s career was also riddled with other sex scandals and corruption allegations.
He was convicted of tax fraud a decade ago and banned from holding office for two years, although his four-year prison sentence was exempt.
Among other accusations, Berlusconi was also accused and initially formally convicted of paying 17-year-old Moroccan Karima El Mahroug, also known by the stage name “Ruby the Heart Stealer”, for sexual services between February and May 2010 when she was under the age of 18.
He was eventually found not guilty on appeal but the trial hung over him for years.
Legal woes accompanied Berlusconi throughout his political career and he was convicted in at least seven cases on serious charges, including bribing a senator and paying off judges.
His sex life was often played out in the world’s press, including lurid details of his notorious “bunga bunga” parties.
Although Berlusconi made light of his reputation as a philanderer, his second wife Veronica Lario did not and she asked for a divorce, saying she could not live with a man who “frequented minors”.
She was initially awarded one of the biggest divorce payouts in Italian history – 1.4 million euros ($A2.42 million) a month in maintenance. But like many court rulings that went against him, Berlusconi appealed and the sum was later reduced to zero.
The many scandals took their toll and in 2011 he quit as prime minister as Italy came close to a Greek-style debt crisis. A jeering crowd shouted their delight when his cortege headed to the president’s office to hand in his resignation.