(27 Nov 2013) The Italian Senate expelled three-time ex-Premier Silvio Berlusconi from Parliament on Wednesday over his tax fraud conviction.
Even though he won't hold a seat in Parliament for at least six years, the 77-year-old pledged to remain involved in politics and urged his followers not to despair following the vote - noting that other political leaders are not lawmakers.
He remains head of his relaunched Forza Italia party, which on Tuesday officially withdrew its support for the government of Premier Enrico Letta, and is now in opposition, and still commands a following that runs into thousands.
The Senate vote on whether to remove Berlusconi from the chamber stemmed from a 2012 law banning anyone sentenced to more than two years in prison from holding or running for public office for six years.
Italy's high court on 1 August upheld Berlusconi's tax fraud conviction, and four-year prison term stemming from his Mediaset empire's purchase of television rights to US films.
The prison term was reduced automatically to one year under a general amnesty, and Berlusconi will serve his time either under house arrest or through public service.
Berlusconi claims he didn't receive a fair trial and that the judges were biased.
His lawyers have also taken their challenge to the 2012 law to the European Court of Human Rights - even though it turns out Berlusconi didn't make much of his Senate role to begin with.
Italian media reported this week that Berlusconi attended just one Senate session since April's elections - and that was when he did an about-face and backed the government in a confidence vote after threatening to bring it down.
Meanwhile, Berlusconi still faces other legal problems, including a seven-year prison term and lifetime ban from holding public office for his conviction of paying an underage prostitute for sex at his infamous "bunga bunga" parties and trying to cover it up.
He has professed his innocence and plans to appeal.
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