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Splitsville for Italy PM & wife

ROME — Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s wife wants a divorce, Italian media reported yesterday, just days after she publicly criticized his par ty’s selection of young women for European elections.

“I have been forced to take this step. I don’t want to add anything else,” Berlusconi’s wife, Veronica, 52, said.

In a two-line statement, the conservative prime minister said, “This is a personal matter that saddens me, that is private, and it seems appropriate not to talk about it.”

Last week, Veronica, who two years ago demanded a public apology from her husband for flirting with younger women, said his party’s choice of female candidates for the European elections was a “shamelessly trashy” process.

She also accused him of going to the Naples birthday bash of an 18-year-old woman, the daughter of a political ac quaintance, but not attending the coming-of-age parties of his own children.