Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi admitted today he was "no saint" but vowed to govern until the end of his mandate amid accusations of cavorting with teenagers and high-end prostitutes.
In his first public remarks since newspapers posted audio tapes of conversations supposedly between him and an escort, a defiant Mr Berlusconi sought to dismiss the scandal with one of his trademark quips.
"There are tonnes of good-looking girls and entrepreneurs out there," he said at the inauguration of a building site for a new motorway in northern Italy.
"I am not a saint, you've all understood that. I hope those at La Repubblicaalso understand it," he said, referring to the left-leaning daily which has led demands that he clear up aspects of his personal life.
The websites of La Repubblicaand weekly magazine L'Espressohave posted recordings of conversations they said were between Berlusconi and Patrizia D'Addario, an escort who says she and other women were paid to attend parties at Berlusconi's residence in Rome.
The 72-year old conservative prime minister, who often boasts of his sexual prowess, has not denied that Ms D'Addario went to his home, but has said that he did not know she was an escort and that he has never paid for sex.
Ms D'Addario (42) says she made the recordings during a night she spent with the prime minister on November 4th, 2008 - the date of US president Barack Obama's historic election victory - and during various telephone conversations.
She has handed the tapes to magistrates investigating a businessman, Giampaolo Tarantini, on suspicion of providing paid escorts to curry political favours for an enterprise in the southern city of Bari, from where D'Addario also hails.
Mr Berlusconi's lawyer Niccolo Ghedini on Monday dismissed the recordings as "totally unlikely and the product of the imagination".
Reuters