A number of Maltese nationals and residents who were in any way involved in the six offshore companies set up in Malta by the Berlusconi empire in the 1990s, can expect to be called to give testimony to the courts of Milan in the near future.

The evidence will form part of the defence’s case in the high profile bribery trial of former Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi and David Mills, a British offshore company specialist and estranged husband of British culture secretary Tessa Jowell.

Witnesses from Malta – who will include anyone that had anything to do with elements of the Maltese ring of offshore companies set up by Mills as part of an elaborate television rights scam – will either be called to Milan to give their evidence, or requested to do so remotely from the Maltese courts. Other witnesses will be called from as far as the US, Ireland, the Bahamas and Qatar.

The defence team has called over 80 witnesses so far, including virtually anyone who signed any documents related to the pair’s financial affairs. However, the defence team has been accused of employing delaying tactics since the procedure of gathering testimony from the four corners of the globe will undoubtedly prove a lengthy affair.

And time is of the essence for the prosecution as the case will be dropped if the trial is not concluded by February next year; two years ago the Berlusconi government had reduced the statute of limitations for perverting the course of justice from 15 to 10 years. It has been established that Mills’ and Berlusconi’s alleged misdeeds had taken place in February 1998.

The trial itself promises to be complex as prosecutors attempt to dissect an intricate web of international bank accounts, offshore companies, six of which were set up in Malta, and millions of euros in money transfers.

In this particular trial, which began on 13 March, Berlusconi stands accused of paying Mills US$600,000 (approximately Lm200,000) for giving favourable testimony in two previous trials in the late 1990s. The pair face prison sentences of between four and 12 years if found guilty.

In a separate trial, Berlusconi, Mills and 12 others stand accused of tax fraud and money laundering activities through the purchase of television rights from the US by Mediaset, the Italian television network owned by Berlusconi. The rights had been purchased between 1994 and 1999 from the US through offshore companies allegedly owned by Berlusconi. The offshore companies then resold the rights to Mediaset at artificially inflated prices.

The Italian authorities are also alleging that when investigations began Mills shipped several boxes of sensitive financial documents to Malta. The offshore companies are also alleged to have been used to help Berlusconi avoid Italian media monopoly rules.

The offshore companies were held by Fininvest, Berlusconi’s main holding company, for which Mills provided financial and legal services.

Both have denied any wrongdoing and Berlusconi, on his part, claims he has been victimised by politically biased, left wing, communist judges. Mills’ lawyers in fact intend to prove the US$600,000 had been gained legitimately.

It was later shown that the funds from the alleged bribe were used to settle the mortgage on a house owned by Mills and his wife. The scandal had exploded in the British press last year and led to the couple’s separation and the north London house being put up for sale.

Berlusconi himself has appeared before the Italian courts on at least six different occasions on corruption charges. On the three occasions he was found guilty, his convictions were either dismissed on appeal or declared void on technicalities.

A report drawn up by the Italian authorities in Milan tells how in April 1996 Mills had been served with an order from the UK’s Serious Fraud Office to hand over the Fininvest files, and describes how boxes of files had been shipped to Malta, from where they have still not been recovered.

The report also details how Mills had mislead investigators by hiding evidence and accuse Mills of making false claims to the authorities about the location of the missing files. The report describes how he handed over useless files while secreting away those demanded by the investigative authorities.

A large cache of the requested documents was eventually discovered in a London warehouse but dozens of boxes of similar files are still being sought by authorities, many of which they believe have been stashed away in Malta.