Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, the billionaire businessman who created Italy's largest media company before transforming the political landscape, has died.
He had been admitted to a Milan hospital on Friday for what aides said were pre-planned tests related to his leukemia.
His admission came just three weeks after he was discharged following a six-week stay at Milan's San Raffaele hospital, during which time doctors revealed he had a rare type of blood cancer.
Mr Berlusconi had suffered ill health for years, from heart surgery in 2016 to a 2020 hospitalisation for coronavirus.
Despite being re-elected to the Senate last year, he was rarely seen in public.
But he remained the official head of his right-wing Forza Italia party, a junior - and occasionally troublesome - partner in Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's coalition government.
Mr Berlusconi led Italy three times between 1994 and 2011, for a total of nine years, wooing voters with a promise of economic success only to be forced out as a debt crisis gripped his country.
But his influence extended well beyond politics, thanks to his extensive TV, newspaper and sporting interests, while his playboy antics kept him in the headlines even in his final years.
He is survived by his 33-year-old girlfriend, Marta Fascina, two ex-wives and five children, some of whom help run his empire, recently estimated to be worth some €6.5 billion.
It is understood there will be a state funeral for Mr Berlusconi in Milan on Wednesday.
Italian Defence Minister Guido Crosetto said Mr Berlusconi's death leaves a "huge void" because he was a great man.
"I loved him very much. Farewell Silvio," Mr Crosetto wrote on Twitter.
Mr Berlusconi burst onto the political scene in the early 1990s, after building up a media and real estate business, where he was viewed as a breath of fresh air after a period of corruption and scandal.
Pitching himself as a modern Italian success story, and backed by his TV stations and newspapers, he secured his first election victory in 1994 with his new movement, Forza Italia (Go Italy!), named after a football chant.
He lasted as prime minister for only nine months, but bounced back with another election win in 2001 after a populist campaign promising jobs and economic growth, signing a 'Contract with Italians' live on television.
He served until 2006, and returned again as prime minister between 2008 and 2011, making him the longest-serving premier in Italy's post-war history.
He was forced to quit as debt-laden Italy - the eurozone's third largest economy - came under intense pressure during the financial crisis.
Read more: Silvio Berlusconi always maintained he was 'no saint'
The tenure of the man dubbed "Il Cavaliere" (The Knight) divided Italians, as much as over his policies - including his controversial decision to join the US-led invasion of Iraq - as his entire approach to life.
Throughout his time in office, prosecutors snapped at his heels, even as his supporters in parliament passed laws to shield him and his allies.
Despite multiple court cases - he claimed in 2021 he had gone through 86 trials - he never spent any time behind bars and successfully appealed convictions for fraud and corruption early in his political career.
In 2013, Berlusconi received a definitive conviction for tax fraud, which saw him carry out community service in a care home for sufferers of Alzheimer's.
He was also long suspected of links to the mafia, but strongly denied it.
'Bunga Bunga' disgrace
On the world stage, Mr Berlusconi was known for his friendships with the likes of Libya's Muammar Gaddafi and Russian President Vladimir Putin - the latter of whom he controversially defended following the 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
He had no time for traditional diplomacy, once likening a German European MP to a Nazi and describing US President Barack Obama as "suntanned".
His image was further tarnished when lurid details emerged of his sex parties at his villa near Milan with its private disco, during a hugely embarrassing trial involving a 17-year-old nightclub dancer.
Mr Berlusconi was sentenced to seven years in prison in 2013 for paying for sex with 17-year-old Karima El-Mahroug, - but this was later overturned after the judge said there was reasonable doubt that he knew she was underage.
He then stood accused of bribing witnesses to lie about his parties, which he always insisted were elegant dinners. He was acquitted in three related trials.
A relationship with another teenager led to the end of his second marriage with former actress Veronica Lario, who left him in 2009 over his "cavorting with minors".
In March 2022, he held a bizarre fake wedding with his girlfriend Marta Fascina.
