Berlusconi calls Obama ‘tanned’ after G20

Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi has invited further international outrage by calling Barack Obama "tanned" - for the second time. Following his return from the G20 summit in Pittsburgh on Friday, he told a crowd in Milan that he was bringing greetings from the United States from "What's his name? Some tanned guy. Ah, Barack Obama!"

The 72-year-old PM also made a dig at America's First Lady, saying: "You wouldn't believe it, but they go sunbathing at the beach together - his wife is also sun-tanned."

It was shortly after Obama's election in November 2008 that Berlusconi first raised eyebrows by saying America's first black president was "young, handsome, and even has a good tan". Later that month he reiterated the remark, saying that anyone who found it racist had no sense of humour and was an "imbecile".

In Pittsburgh, Michelle Obama pointedly chose to shake Berlusconi's hand rather than give him hug and a kiss on the cheek, as she did other world leaders.

Her reluctance to appear too close to a man who has been dogged by scandals over his personal life - including accusations that he "consorts with minors" and that he slept with at least one callgirl at his private residence in Rome – will have been appreciated back in Rome.

When journalist Maria Laura Rodota published an open latter in Corriere della Sera calling for a 'new feminism', partly in reaction to Berlusconi's behaviour and the attitude to women on his Mediaset TV channels, she was overwhelmed with the response. "It was like uncorking a bottle," she said. ·