Silvio Berlusconi
Amid crisis in the Eurozone, italy's credit rating was slashed last week - Spain suffered a similar fate on Friday. Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said the decision was expected. Reuters

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi is in trouble yet again -- this time for making negative remarks about his own country.

According to reports, investigators said they secretly tape recorded Berlusconi condemning Italy as a sh--ty country that sickened him.

The Prime Minister also reportedly expressed his frustration over police and judicial investigations of his private life and business activities and that he is eager to leave Italy.

The recorded conversations were conducted in connection with warrants for the arrest of two people who were seeking to blackmail Berlusconi.

Apparently, Berlusconi made the comments while speaking on the phone with Valter Lavitola, a reporter who is now under an arrest warrant. Italian police said that Lavitola was the conduit between Berlusconi and Gianpaolo Tarantini and Angela Devenuto – the two who were arrested on charges of seeking to blackmail Berlusconi in connection with an ongoing sex scandal involving the Prime Minister.

They can tap my telephone calls. I don't give a f---, Berlusconi reportedly said on the tapes.
I'm getting out to mind my own f---ing business, from somewhere else, and so I'm leaving this sh--ty country, of which I'm sickened.

Investigators claim that Tarantini paid escorts to attend parties with Berlusconi. Prosecutors in Naples also said Berlusconi was extorted by Tarantini to the tune of half-a-million euros following veiled and implied threats.”
Tarantini, who is cooperating with authorities, has denied blackmailing Berlusconi.

Not surprisingly, Berlusconi’s political enemies, especially on the left, have already pounced on the embarrassing comments.

Luigi Zanda of the Democratic Party, told the La Repubblica newspaper that it is the Italians who are sick of Berlusconi.

Antonio Di Pietro of the center-left Values Party told media: Having a prime minister who values his own country in such a mean-spirited way is like living in the Third World.”