Italy's Silvio Berlusconi: The controversial showman

In September 2001, two weeks after the terror attacks in the United States, Berlusconi caused outrage in the Islamic world when he said the West "should be confident of the superiority of our civilisation".

In 2010, he offended the Jewish community in turn when he told a joke about a Jewish family hiding another Jew for a hefty rent, without telling him that World War II was over.

In 2003, Berlusconi sparked a diplomatic crisis between Berlin and Rome when, after being heckled by German Euro-MP Martin Schulz and others at the European Parliament, he said that the Germans would be perfect to play the role of a Nazi camp guard in a film.

Two years later, in 2005, he offended Finland when he criticised its food and claimed he had used his "playboy" charm to convince the country's then-president Tarja Halonen to allow the EU's Food Safety Authority to be located in Parma, rather than Finland.

In 2008, shortly after the election of Barack Obama as US president, Berlusconi said "he's young, he's handsome and he is tanned".

In 2003, he defended the record of Italian Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini, claiming "he never killed anyone" but merely "used to send people on holiday".

In 2006, he said that Chinese Communists under Mao Zedong had babies "boiled to fertilise the fields".

In 2008, Berlusconi ruffled feathers in Spain, when he mocked the prominent role women had in the new cabinet. He said the government of (former) prime minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero was "too pink", predicting that "he'll have problems leading them".

In 2009, after two rapes in Rome and the wider region, he said he wished there were enough soldiers to protect "beautiful girls" from rape, noting that rapes were impossible to prevent "even in a police state".

He then in 2010 tried to laugh off a potentially damaging sex scandal involving a young girl by saying, "It's better to be passionate about beautiful women than to be gay."

Berlusconi compared himself with Napoleon and Jesus Christ during the election campaign in 2006.

In 2009, in the aftermath of the earthquake in L'Aquila that killed more than 300 people, he suggested that those left homeless should look at their plight as a kind of camping trip.

Berlusconi suffered a number of health scares. He underwent heart surgery in 2016 and in 2020 was hospitalised with coronavirus.

Discharged 11 days later, he told reporters it was "perhaps the most difficult ordeal of my life", but added: "Once again, I seem to have got away with it!"

In September 2022, seven months after Russia invaded Ukraine, Berlusconi suggested Russian President Vladimir Putin – a long-time friend – had been "pushed" into the war by his entourage.

A month later, leaked recordings emerged in which Berlusconi described receiving 20 bottles of vodka from Putin for his birthday, adding that "I responded with bottles of Lambrusco (wine) and an equally sweet letter".

Berlusconi later blamed the war on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.