From the moment Silvio Berlusconi entered Italian politics, he has embodied Winston Churchill’s famous line about "a bull who carries his own China shop around with him."

Recently, the Italian Prime Minister’s trail of noisy destruction led him directly into the heart of Europe, leading many observers to fear that the continent’s fragile union could be jeopardised by the ill-considered words and unsavoury political judgement of the industrialist and media magnate.

Even as Berlusconi offered a lukewarm apology to German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder for having likened a German parliamentarian to a Nazi concentration-camp guard, politicians across Europe were declaring the European Union leadership a disaster and calling for changes in its rotating presidency.

Long before he began his six-month term as President, many Europeans had feared that Berlusconi’s knack for offence and controversy could derail the EU’s impressive momentum. It is trying to incorporate seven new member-nations and draft a constitution that will create a United States of Europe. But few could have guessed that he would cause so much damage so quickly.

During a debate about the EU’s efforts to mend its relations with Washington, German Green Party representative Martin Schulz criticised Berlusconi for exercising control over almost 90 per cent of Italy’s media, often to his own political advantage. Schulz said he had deliberately tried to raise the Italian’s temper. "I made a contribution to confirm the warnings that people have made about Berlusconi," he told the Berliner Zeitung newspaper. Berlusconi—a billionaire with holdings in almost every sector of the Italian economy—faced criminal trials on bribery and corruption charges that threatened to unseat him. He escaped the charges by altering Italy’s laws to give himself immunity from prosecution.

In response to the parliamentarian’s remark, Berlusconi suggested that Schulz play a kapo (a Nazi concentration-camp prisoner, usually Jewish, given guard duty) in an Italian TV movie, a remark that left the EU aghast.

After Berlusconi’s semi-apology (he said he regretted that his remarks were misinterpreted), Schroeder announced that he now considers the matter closed. But many politicians, especially those to the left of centre, suggested that the Italian Prime Minister had poisoned the EU, just as it was trying to complete a hard-fought constitution and get past the deep rift created this winter by the debate over the war in Iraq.

"The whole point of the European ideal is to get away from crude national stereotyping," said Robin Cook, Britain’s former foreign secretary. "I am appalled that a president-in-office of the EU should cause such offence and revive conflicts which the rest of us long to put behind us."

Anna Lindh, the Swedish Foreign Minister, said that Berlusconi "is not felt to be representative of European countries," and called for a change in the system of rotating presidents. "He has his six-month presidency in front of him and it is unfortunate.... That’s why it would be better with an elected president. I think it is a problem that he handles the judicial system as he has done in Italy."