ITALY: Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi said last night that he would not attend a meeting of European politicians with Pope Benedict this month after opposition leaders accused the Vatican of meddling in politics.
Mr Berlusconi had been expected to go to an audience with members of the European People's Party but the announcement caused uproar among the opposition who said he should not be meeting the pope so close to the April elections.
In announcing that he would not go, Mr Berlusconi said the meeting was only for European members of parliament. He did not explain why he waited more than 24 hours to issue his statement.
"I will not be going to the pope. The visit involves only the European parliamentary delegation of which I am not a part. Therefore, it is not in my schedule," he said. "But I'm going to win the elections just the same."
Throughout the day Mr Berlusconi's political allies had defended his right to go to the meeting and accused the centre-left of behaving with "visceral anti-clericalism".
Mr Berlusconi's presence in the Vatican would have boken a longstanding tradition that the pope does not meet Italian politicians during a general election campaign. Pope Benedict's willingness to see him had been interpreted as an endorsement of the Italian right by the church.
There had been no plans for the pontiff to see Romano Prodi, the leader of the opposition, who - unlike Mr Berlusconi - is a lifelong practising Catholic. A petition on the internet beseeching the pope not to see the prime minister had attracted thousands of endorsements by last night.
Piero Fassino, leader of the formerly communist Left Democrats, said politicians should "avoid exploiting a figure as important and authoritative as the pope".
The centre-left parties feared that Mr Berlusconi's three television channels would have given the visit high-profile coverage to woo undecided Catholic voters in the closing stages of a tight race. Last week there was an outcry over the time they devoted to the prime minister's visit to the US to meet President Bush and address Congress.
"We respect and defend the right of the church to address questions of values, but it is very serious to receive only one of the candidates for prime minister just ahead of the ballot," Green Party leader Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio had said.
The most recent polls have shown the prime minister trailing by 4-5 percentage points. Voting is to be held on April 9th-10th.
Mr Berlusconi and his allies have spent months courting the Catholic vote. This year's budget contained a tax break that frees the church from having to pay local authority rates on its properties.