Former premier Silvio Berlusconi and British corporate lawyer David Mills were ordered on Monday to stand trial for allegedly perverting the course of justice in two corruption trials.
Milan Judge Fabio Paparella ruled that the two be indicted after preliminary hearings in which prosecutors accused Mills of accepting a $600,000 kickback from Berlusconi.
The trial is due to open in Milan on March 13 and judicial sources said the defendants faced sentences of three to eight years if convicted.
Berlusconi and Mills already face trial next month in Milan on separate corruption charges.
Mills, who is the estranged husband of British Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell, helped Berlusconi set up a network of off-shore companies before the billionaire media magnate's 1994 debut into politics.
Prosecutors believe the lawyer received $600,000 as payment for not revealing details of Berlusconi's media empire in two trials against the ex-premier in 1997 and 1998.
Berlusconi and Mills deny wrongdoing, insisting that Mills received the money in question from Neapolitan shipping magnate Diego Attanasio.
The Berlusconi-Mills case has received scant attention in the Italian media but has made big waves in Britain, where Jowell was accused - and subsequently cleared - of breaching parliamentary standards by co-signing a mortgage with Mills allegedly linked to the $600,000.
Mills, who separated from his wife under the media glare on the case, said in a letter sent to his accountant in 2004 that the payment was a "gift" and that he had saved Berlusconi "from a great deal of trouble".
"I told no lies but I turned some very tricky corners," the letter said. He has since disowned that letter and insists the payment came from Attanasio.
Jowell refused to comment on the matter on Monday when questioned by reporters in London.
"I have nothing to say. I've already said everything I have to say," the minister said.
Mills and Berlusconi, who was defeated by Premier Romano Prodi in Italy's April general election and now heads the centre-right opposition, are also to stand trial in a related case concerning alleged fraud at Berlusconi's private TV network company Mediaset.
That trial, involving a total of 14 defendants including Mediaset Chairman Fedele Confalonieri and several top former officials at Berlusconi's Fininvest family holding company, is due to open in Milan on November 21.
For Berlusconi the most serious charge is tax fraud which carries a sentence of up to 6 years.
The case centres on Mediaset's purchase of TV rights for US films before 1999 through two offshore firms.
Prosecutors believe that in deals covering the period 1994-99, the purchase costs of US films were artificially inflated, allowing Mediaset to avoid tax amounting to almost 125 billion old lire. They also say a slush fund was created for Berlusconi and his family.
The defendants all deny wrongdoing.
Meanwhile, Berlusconi's defence team launched a bid to overturn Paparella's ruling, filing a fresh appeal for the judge to be removed from the case.
The defence had argued that Paparella was unfit to rule in the case because he was also the judge who ordered the Mediaset fraud trial.
The defence's complaint was thrown out by a Milan appeals court in August but the Supreme Court must now decide definitively on the matter.
Berlusconi's lawyer, MP Nicolo' Ghedini, said that Paparella should not have been allowed to rule on the bribery case before the Supreme Court had issued its verdict.
"It's all so predictable. They didn't even wait for the Supreme Court's decision," Ghedini said.
Berlusconi's political supporters rallied to his cause, echoing the opposition leader's long-standing claims that Milan prosecutors are hounding him for political reasons.
Berlusconi spokesman Paolo Bonaiuti said that "this trial is another lowly attack on Silvio Berlusconi. It has nothing to do with justice and a lot to do with politics".
Members of Berlusconi's Forza Italia party said the trial was also an attempt to shift the public spotlight away from the government's unpopular 2007 budget.
The 70-year-old Berlusconi, who is Italy's richest man, has been at the centre of numerous corruption investigations into his vast business empire.
He has always denied wrong-doing and has never received a guilty verdict. In some cases he has been cleared because of the statute of limitations or changes to the law introduced when he was in government.
