I’m the ’star of summits’, brags Silvio Berlusconi

LONDON - Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has bragged that he is the ’star’ of international summits he attends and that foreign leaders line up to have their photographs taken with him.

He, however, admitted that he is of ‘a certain age’ and that he will have to step down one day.

Berlusconi has in the past few weeks attended a security summit in Kazakhstan, an EU-Africa meeting in Libya and the Nato conference in Lisbon.

“I was the star,” the Telegraph quoted him as telling supporters of his People of Freedom party in Rome.

“Everybody came to have their photograph taken with me,” he added.

Berlusconi claimed that the adoration of fellow dignitaries was due to his political experience as well as his success as a business tycoon.

The Italian Premier has in the past boasted that he has the stamina of a much younger man and even that he is ‘Superman’, despite being 74.

But in a rare admission of his fallibility, he said: “I’m absolutely aware that I am at a certain age and that I will have to step down sooner or later. But I will pass on the baton when I have completed our [political] programme.”

The media mogul, whose approval rating is at its lowest since he was elected in May 2008, may have to resign if he fails to win a crucial confidence vote in the Italian Parliament next week. (ANI)