ROME, April 5 (UPI) -- Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi says if Italy returns to the polls to end political deadlock, his People of Freedom party will win.
Berlusconi made the comments Friday on his forzasilvio.it website, Italy's ANSA news agency reported.
He said a coalition between his center-right party and the center-left Democratic Party is needed to bring stability to Italy.
"A return to the polls by June is not our first choice because we know that the most urgent matter is to pull the country out of the crisis in the shortest time possible," Berlusconi said.
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However, should Italians go back to the polls to re-elect its parliament, Berlusconi predicted that his PdL party would win.
"Only if the Democratic Party refuses this solution [of a grand coalition] will we have to turn to early elections. If the country votes, according to the latest polls, we would take the Senate and the House," Berlusconi said.
Democratic Party head Pier Luigi Bersani has refused to join forces with Berlusconi.
Meanwhile, Ruby, a Moroccan woman at the center of a sex trial against Berlusconi, staged a protest outside the Milan courthouse where he is being tried at on Thursday, ANSA said.
Berlusconi is accused of paying to have sex with Ruby while she was underage.
Inside the courthouse on Friday, a lawyer acting on behalf of Ruby, whose real name is Karima El Mahroug, said her client was "truly exhausted and enraged."
"She was anxious to tell her truth and she wanted to do so in the context of the trial against Berlusconi," lawyer Paola Boccardi said.
