Berlusconi under fire for attending Putin’s party

Party-loving Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi has been criticised for putting his "special relationship" with old friend Vladimir Putin over his country's political interests.

Leftwing Italian media and opposition politicians claim Berlusconi – already embattled following a series of legal and sex scandals - cancelled a meeting with the King of Jordan in order to celebrate Putin's birthday.

Berlusconi was scheduled to meet King Abdullah, who is in Rome this week. But the Italian PM apparently spurned the chance to help the Middle East peace process, choosing instead to fly to St Petersburg on Wednesday to meet with Russian prime minister Putin and the city's mayor, Valentina Matvienko.

According to the left-leaning daily newspaper La Repubblica, Berlusconi arrived in Russia "carrying fine wines" for Putin. Putin's spokesman Dmitri Peskov described Berlusconi's trip as "a private visit but with working content", that will include talks on energy.

Peskov denied that Berlusconi would be attending a party at a villa on Lake Valdai, south of St Petersburg. He told the Times: "I can't exclude that they certainly will be somehow celebrating his birthday, but it's not the main reason for the visit."

Any belated birthday celebrations involving Putin - who turned 57 on October 7 - or the 73-year-old Italian prime minister are likely to feature dancing girls. Last year, Berlusconi boasted that he had taken a troupe of dancers from Rome to his Sardinian residence to entertain Putin. In 2007, Putin had arranged a 'Dance of the Veils' in honour of Berlusconi's visit to St Petersburg.

Centre-left leader Pierluigi Bersani, a leader of Italy's centre-left opposition, said he was "appalled" at Berlusconi's decision to give priority to the Russian trip rather than meeting King Abdullah, adding that the snub was "inexplicable". Democratic Party senator Francesco Rutelli decried Berlusconi's "special relationship" with Putin: "Where else in the world can a government leader go on a secret trip to meet with the leader of one of the main countries in the world?"

Meanwhile, Berlusconi's love of the fairer sex appears not to be reciprocated - at least by the 98,000 Italian women who have signed up to a 'stop Berlusconi' petition. The petition, which reads "This man offends us, stop him" was launched by La Repubblica after he phoned into a late-night TV discussion programme to say that opposition deputy Rosy Bindi - a 58-year-old, bespectacled and matronly figure - was "prettier than she is intelligent". Bindi replied: "I am not a woman at your disposal," in a reference to the prime minister's recent sex scandals involving young women.