Brusca: Mafya Berlusconi'ye destek için solu suçlamayı düşündü

Mafia wanted to blame Left for 1992-1993 bombings to help Berlusconi - Brusca

(ANSA) - ROME, 09 SET - Former Mafia boss Giovanni Brusca told a court hearing on Wednesday that Cosa Nostra considered blaming the Italian Left for its bombing campaign of 1992 and 1993, in which, among other things, prosecutors Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino were murdered, in order to aid media billionaire Silvio Berlusconi's entry into politics. "It was 1994," Brusca, who was involved in the Capaci bombing in which Falcone was killed and was released from jail in 2021 after turning State witness, told a trial into alleged calumny by Salvatore Baiardo, a man linked to the Graviano mafia family, against TV presenter Massimo Giletti. "In discussions with (jailed Cosa Nostra boss Leoluca) Bagarella after the 1992 and 1993 bombings, we talked about using them as a political tool, as if they had been suggested by the Left, in order to help Berlusconi and be able to direct his entry into politics," Brusca added, speaking via video link from a safe location. "(Late Mafia killer Vittorio) Mangano told us he had made contact and informed Berlusconi, via (aide Marcello) Dell'Utri or other channels, and he reported back that Berlusconi had expressed thanks and said he would give us a hand as soon as possible. "We also send him a veiled threat that if he didn't help us, we would plant more bombs to put him into difficulty politically". Cosa Nostra launched its bombing campaign in 1992 after the Supreme Court upheld the convictions of over 300 mobsters in the Maxi Trial against the Sicilian Mafia, making them definitive. A series of cases seeking to link late ex-premier and media magnate Berlusconi to the Mafia have been dismissed by Italian courts over the years. "The senseless theory (that the 1992-93 Mafia bombings helped the birth of Berlusconi's Forza Italia party) fuelled 30 years of suspicion, insinuations, and smear campaigns against Silvio Berlusconi and Marcello Dell'Utri," the ex-premier's eldest child, businesswoman Marina Berlusconi, said after a court threw out a Florence investigation into these allegations in June. "But in the end, it has produced nothing but a mountain of waste paper, both in court and in the newsrooms of some newspapers". (ANSA). Read article...