Silvio Berlusconi will need weeks of treatment after Milan attack

Silvio Berlusconi will need weeks of treatment for the physical injuries and mental trauma suffered when he was assaulted by a mentally ill man in Milan on Sunday, his doctors have said.

The Italian Prime Minister’s nose was broken and he lost two teeth and half a litre of blood in the attack, at the end of a political rally. He said it was a “miracle” he had not been blinded when a chunky souvenir made of marble and metal was thrown at his face.

His assailant, Massimo Tartaglia, an electronics engineer and video games inventor with no criminal record, is said to have told police that he hated Mr Berlusconi. He has been charged with aggravated assault.

Video footage shows Mr Tartaglia, 42, waving a replica of Milan cathedral in the air several times before hurling it at the Prime Minister’s head as he greeted wellwishers and signed autographs.
Mr Berlusconi’s doctor, Alberto Zangrillo, said the injuries were more serious than initially thought, and he was able to eat only with great difficulty. “I found him shaken, embittered, as if he had been woken from a bad dream — really disheartened,” he said.

The Prime Minister has been kept in hospital for another day, and will not be attending the Copenhagen climate change summit this week.

Mr Berlusconi was telephoned by President Napolitano and visited by close aides and four of his children yesterday. Mr Tartaglia’s father, Alessandro, said the family voted centre-left, but nursed no hatred for Mr Berlusconi. “Massimo has psychiatric problems, but he has never done anyone any harm. He has never had any political involvement,” he said.

However, he added: “This episode has been brewing in the negative climate which has taken hold in Italy recently.”

Police suspect Mr Tartaglia’s attack was premeditated, because his pockets contained a pepper spray and a crucifix. A spokesman said Mr Berlusconi was still experiencing “terrible headaches” and was on painkillers and antibiotics. His nose will have to be reset, and he has been given stitches, though it is not clear if he will need surgery.

Mr Berlusconi is reported to have told Paolo Bonaiuti, his spokesman, on the way to the rally that he feared “something might happen”. Mariastella Gelmini, the Education Minister, who was near Mr Berlusconi at the time, said the impact of the object as it struck him was so loud she thought he had been killed.

Right-wing politicians blamed the Left for a “campaign of hate” and portrayed Mr Berlusconi as the victim of a conspiracy, even though Mr Tartaglia apparently acted alone. Hospital officials quoted Mr Berlusconi as asking: “Why do they hate me so much?”

Leaders of the Centre Left said the Prime Minister had created the “climate of hate” through his attacks on the President, the judiciary and the press, who are accused of frustrating his increasingly desperate attempts to change the law to halt legal action against him for alleged corruption.

Rosy Bindi, of the main opposition Democratic Party, said Mr Berlusconi was adept at “playing the victim”. Antonio Di Pietro, the former anti-corruption magistrate and leader of the centre-left Italy of Values party, condemned violence, but said Mr Berlusconi had himself “instigated” the attack. However, Pier Luigi Bersani, the Democratic Party leader who visited Mr Berlusconi in hospital, said he condemned the attack “with no ifs or buts as an unspeakable gesture”.

Amid increasing questions over how the assailant could get so close to the Prime Minister, Roberto Maroni, the Interior Minister, insisted that the rally had been “correctly policed”. The Corriere della Sera newspaper, however, outlined successive security breaches as Mr Berlusconi’s bodyguards failed to shield him from the projectile, and then neglected to drive him away at speed. Instead, he stood on the frame of his car door, continuing to wave to the crowd with blood streaming down his face. “What if there had been an accomplice with a gun?” the paper asked.

Ignazio La Russa, the Defence Minister, complained that police had done nothing to stop protesters who jeered. He said he had run to help police to arrest Mr Tartaglia “to save him from a lynching”, and that he was appalled by comments on the web praising the attacker.

Mr Berlusconi was visited in hospital by Gianfranco Fini, co-founder of the ruling People of Liberty party and his heir apparent. “This is truly a bad day for Italy, and it’s the duty of all the political forces to ensure that Italy does not go back to the years of violence,” he said, in a reference to the “Years of Lead” in the 1970s and 1980s.
Source: The times