Rome, 29 October (AKI) - The lawyer of Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi and MP for the People of Freedom party Niccolo Ghedini wants to move any future trials of the government's top office-bearers to the capital Rome from the northern city of Milan. Berlusconi has repeatedly accused prosecutors in Milan of leftwing bias against him.

The proposal, according to Italian daily La Repubblica would be "When crimes are committed by the highest offices of state, the appropriate court should be that of Rome."

The proposal came two days after an appeals court in Milan confirmed the four-and-a-half-year sentence for corruption of British tax lawyer David Mills after he allegedly accepted a 600,000 dollars bribe from Berlusconi in 1997.

The verdict prompted Ghedini to blame the judges in Milan.

"One more time, we can confirm that in Milan you cannot have a trial when there is any connection, even indirect, with president (of the council of ministers) Berlusconi," he said on Tuesday.

On Wednesday, Berlusconi attacked the country's judiciary after the Mills verdict calling them "communists".

Mills had appealed the four-and-a-half-year jail term handed to him for accepting the bribe in exchange for giving false testimony in court. Mills maintains he is innocent.

The sentence is likely to make the premier's defence case harder. But observers say it is unlikely Berlusconi will stand trial in the Mills case as the charges against him expire in 2011.

Also, on 7 October, Italy's Constitutional Court struck down the so-called 'Lodo Alfano' law, which granted legal immunity to the four most senior office-bearers including the post of prime minister.

The court rejected the law on the grounds that it violated the principle that all citizens are equal before the law.