Italy's parties deadlocked on presidential vote

Italy's parliament failed to elect a new president during a second round of voting Thursday, sending into a third round a ballot many hope will herald the end of a two-month impasse over a new government but which threatens fresh political divisions. Whoever is elected will face the unenviable task of trying to bring the bickering parties together to break a deadlock that has raised fears of instability in the eurozone's third-largest economy. "This leaves Italy in a bigger mess than ever," James Walston, professor of international relations at the American University in Rome, told AFP. None of the candidates managed to win the necessary two-thirds support in the second round of voting and the majority of the ballots were spoilt by party members from across the political sphere playing for time in the hope of finding a winning candidate to agree on. "They are buying time for negotiations," said Walston, adding that the main casualty of the impasse was the centre-left, which was rocked internally by a controversial last-minute bid for a deal with the right. Just hours before the first vote, Italy's two main political blocs had agreed to back Franco Marini, a pipe-smoking 80-year-old seen as having formidable political skills. But leftist leader Pier Luigi Bersani's bid to clinch a deal with his rival Silvio Berlusconi over Marini infuriated many within the centre-left bloc and rebel voters came out in support for Stefano Rodota, a widely respected 79-year-old human rights advocate. Voters from Bersani's Democratic Party (PD) were set to meet before Friday's vote in a bid to find a common candidate, after young members of the party protesting against Marini seized and occupied a PD branch in Tuscany. Slammed as having neither public support nor international standing, Marini failed to garner enough support in either vote and Walston said the former Christian Democrat was likely out of the running. Dissidents said they would not vote for such an establishment figure and many across the left accused Bersani of cosying up to scandal-tainted ex-premier Berlusconi and the right. The voting to elect a successor to President Giorgio Napolitano brings together both chambers of parliament as well as regional representatives, with a total of 1,007 people eligible to vote. A candidate must be supported by a two-thirds majority in the first three rounds of voting or by a simple majority from the fourth vote onwards. Experts said the parties would likely spoil their ballots in the third round on Friday, scheduled to begin at 0800 GMT, before voting properly in the fourth.