ROME: Suspense mounted in Italy yesterday ahead of a court ruling for former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi which could upset the fragile coalition government in the eurozone’s third largest economy.
Italy’s highest court is due to rule on an appeal by the playboy billionaire tycoon against a tax fraud conviction in a case that first went to trial in 2006.
Berlusconi at his last trial was given a sentence of a year in prison and a five-year ban from parliament, which has been suspended pending this final appeal.
“Countdown” read a headline in the Corriere della Sera daily, with analysts in the press saying the ruling could come any time between Wednesday and Friday.
Right-to-die: Britons lose legal battle
LONDON: A British court yesterday rejected an appeal by a paralysed road accident victim and the relatives of a man who died after suffering locked-in syndrome for the right to euthanasia.
The Court of Appeal dismissed a challenge by Paul Lamb and the family of Tony Nicklinson against an August 2012 ruling in the High Court that Nicklinson did not have the right to ask a doctor to end his life.
The three judges hearing the case said it was the role of parliament to legislate on such a subject. The law "relating to assisting suicide cannot be changed by judicial decision", they said in a written judgement.
Sikh gang guilty of UK attack on general
LONDON: A Sikh gang was found guilty by a British court yesterday of slashing the throat of the Indian general who oversaw the 1984 assault on Amritsar Golden Temple.
Two men and a woman were convicted of attacking retired lieutenant general Kuldip Singh Brar, 78, as he walked through London’s West End entertainment district with his wife Meena on September 30 last year. Another man has pleaded guilty to the attack.
The court heard the gang targeted Brar in revenge for his leading role in the attack — Operation Blue Star — against Sikh militants in Amritsar, northwest India, which left at least 500 people dead.
Agencies
