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Today's paper. Last Updated: 06/04/2012

Dini Picks 'Technician' Ministers

ROME -- Prime Minister-designate Lamberto Dini on Tuesday fashioned Italy's latest government, weighting it heavily with professors and judges, but immediately ran into trouble.


Leaders of the outgoing conservative coalition of media tycoon Silvio Berlusconi said they would not support the new Cabinet when it goes before Parliament for approval.


President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro was to swear in the Cabinet later Tuesday evening.


Dini's announcement ended four days of intense maneuvering by Berlusconi and his allies to make sure some of their men remained in what will be Italy's 54th postwar government.


Those efforts were rebuffed as Dini hewed to the line of Scalfaro, who had tapped the former central banker on Friday to compose a Cabinet of "technicians'' without party ties.


Dini announced his list at a news conference after a meeting with the president. On it were Susanna Agnelli, sister of Fiat head Giovanni Agnelli and a foreign ministry undersecretary in four previous governments, as foreign minister; former armed forces chief of staff Domenico Corcione at defense; a high court judge, Antonio Brancaccio at interior; and Filippo Mancuso, an ex-prosecutor at the appeals court, as justice minister. He kept the treasury portfolio, which he held under Berlusconi.


Dini said he chose "persons of great experience and unquestionable impartiality.''


The leftist opposition to Berlusconi, a media tycoon, had opposed the return of Berlusconi government ministers. Scalfaro also was reported to have resisted their presence.


Despite the resignation of Berlusconi Dec. 22 as premier, he tried to remain a power-broker. After he unsuccessfully lobbied for his own return or fast elections, he argued that a new government without representation of his coalition would violate the will of the voters, who last March handed Berlusconi a sweeping victory.


Dini was likely to gain the backing of the Northern League, a populist regional party, and the former Communist party, the Democratic Party of the Left.




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