page_title: Policies of Silvio Berlusconi
section_title: Foreign policy
hierarchical_section_title: Policies of Silvio Berlusconi / Foreign policy
caption_attribution_description: President Barack Obama meets with Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi in the Oval Office of the White House, June 15, 2009. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza) This official White House photograph is in the public domain from a copyright perspective, so while restrictions such as personality or privacy rights may apply, in general, manipulations are allowed.
context_page_description: Silvio Berlusconi was the Prime Minister of Italy, the head of the country's government, for almost ten years.
context_section_description: Berlusconi and his cabinets have had a strong tendency to support American foreign policies, despite the policy divide between the U.S. and many founding members of the European Union (Germany, France, Belgium) during the Bush administration. Under his lead the Italian Government also shifted its traditional position on foreign policy from being the most pro-Arab western government towards a greater friendship with Israel and Turkey (Silvio Berlusconi acted as wedding witness for the son of the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan) than in the past, hence rebalancing relations with all the Mediterranean countries to reach equal closeness with them. Berlusconi is one of the strongest supporters of Turkey's application to accede to the European Union. In order to support Turkey's application the Italian Premier invited Prime Minister Erdoğan to take part in a meeting of the European leaders of Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom, gathered in L'Aquila for the 2009 G8 summit. Italy, with Berlusconi in office, became a solid ally of the United States due to his support in deploying Italian troops in the War in Afghanistan and the Iraq War following the 2003 invasion of Iraq in the War on Terror.
  Berlusconi, in his meetings with United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan and U.S. President George W. Bush, said that he pushed for "a clear turnaround in the Iraqi situation" and for a quick handover of sovereignty to the government chosen by the Iraqi people. By the end of Berlusconi's administration, Italy had some 2,700 troops deployed in Southern Iraq. Italian troops were gradually withdrawn from Iraq in the second half of 2006 with the last soldiers leaving the country in December of the same year in the Romano Prodi government administration.
caption: US President Barack Obama meets Silvio Berlusconi in the Oval Office of the White House
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