{"id":36664,"date":"2023-05-06T13:46:15","date_gmt":"2023-05-06T13:46:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/italys-berlusconi-sends-video\/"},"modified":"2023-05-06T13:48:59","modified_gmt":"2023-05-06T13:48:59","slug":"italys-berlusconi-sends-video","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/italys-berlusconi-sends-video\/","title":{"rendered":"Italy’s Berlusconi sends video message to Forza party from hospital"},"content":{"rendered":"

MILAN (Reuters) – Former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi sent a video message to his Forza Italia party on Saturday in his first appearance since being hospitalised a month ago, saying he is ready to return to work.<\/p>\n

Wearing a blue shirt and suit and heavy make-up, Berlusconi, 86, appeared sitting at a desk with the Italian and European flags behind him next to a Forza Italia banner.<\/p>\n

“I never stopped, not even in the past few weeks. I worked on the party’s new structure and I’m ready to return to work with you and fight alongside you our fights for freedom,” he said.<\/p>\n

Berlusconi recorded the message from his hospital room after doctors and relatives prevented his discharge out of fear he would try to attend in person a two-day convention of his Forza Italia party in Milan, according to daily La Repubblica.<\/p>\n

The four-times prime minister was hospitalised on April 5 and spent nearly two weeks in intensive care, stirring speculation that his life might be in danger and drawing a stream of family and friends to his bedside.<\/p>\n

Treated for a lung infection linked to chronic leukaemia, Berlusconi came out of intensive care on April 16 and his condition has steadily improved, doctors’ statements say.<\/p>\n

“In the past few weeks I’ve felt the affection … of so many people, including my political opponents and I obviously thank them, but it’s your affection, it was your embrace that helped me overcome a really dangerous pneumonia,” he said.<\/p>\n

Speaking for around 20 minutes, Berlusconi recounted at length his decision to relinquish executive roles at his business empire 30 years ago to enter politics “to save Italy from communism.”<\/p>\n

“We’re the essential and loyal pillar of this majority, we’re the backbone of this government,” he said, referring to the right-wing administration of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.<\/p>\n

\n

(Reporting by Valentina Za; Editing by Mike Harrison)<\/p>\n

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MILAN (Reuters) – Former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi sent a video message to his Forza Italia party on Saturday in his first appearance since being hospitalised a month ago, saying he is ready to return to work. Wearing a blue shirt and suit and heavy make-up, Berlusconi, 86, appeared sitting at a desk with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":36669,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1222],"tags":[1223],"class_list":["post-36664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-world-news","tag-updated"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportTopNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ45066-VIEWIMAGE.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36664"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36664\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36670,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36664\/revisions\/36670"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36669"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}