Italian Senate expels Berlusconi from parliament

The Italian Senate Wednesday voted in favour of stripping former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi of his seat in parliament over his tax fraud conviction.

Prime Minister Enrico Letta's centre-left Democratic Party (PD) along with leftwing Left, Ecology and Freedom (SEL) and the anti-establishment Five-Star Movement (M5S) backed the ejection, Xinhua reported.

The vote came under a 2012 anti-corruption law adopted before the highest court in August upheld a verdict of four years in jail, commuted to a year because of an amnesty, against the 77-year-old leader for tax fraud in buying film rights for his television network.

The conviction was Berlusconi's first definitive sentence in two decades of legal battles.

He is too old to go to jail under the Italian law and has requested to serve the year by doing social service rather than under house arrest.

Berlusconi is still appealing a seven-year term for sex with an underage prostitute and abuse of power to cover it up as well as a one-year term for involvement in the publication of an illegally obtained wiretap. He has also been indicted on charges of bribing a senator.

The three-time prime minister said before the vote that his ejection would be a "coup" and accused the PD of "political homicide".

Speaking at a rally near his house in Rome close to the time of the start of voting, Berlusconi reaffirmed that he has always been the victim of left-wing judiciary.