Editor slammed for Berlusconi comments

ROME, Aug. 28 (UPI) -- Vittorio Feltri of the Italian newspaper Il Giornale says fellow media editor Dino Boffo should not have criticized Premier Silvio Berlusconi's lifestyle.

Feltri slammed Boffo in an opinion piece titled "Why We Are Unmasking The Moralists" on Friday, the same day his paper featured the headline "The Supermoralist Condemned For Harassment" regarding Boffo, the Italian news agency, ANSA, reported.

The two published works criticize Boffo, editor of the Avvenire daily newspaper, on his negative comments about Berlusconi.

"Boffo has become in the eyes of many people the interpreter of the church's thinking on the scandal that has been hogging the headlines since the start of the summer,'' said Feltri, who detailed a 2004 fine Boffo paid after being accused of pestering a married woman.

''Well, if the bishops have entrusted Boffo with the task of being their spokesman they are way off the mark because ... he is bereft of the moral requisites for playing the moralist"

Boffo has condemned the criticism of his comments.

ANSA said Berlusconi has been the target of criticism in recent months because of an alleged affair with a teenage girl and his impending divorce from his wife, Veronica Lario.