Silvio Berlusconi has been sentenced to seven years in prison and banned from holding public office for life at the conclusion of a sex and abuse of office trial that is likely to raise tensions between the two main parties in Italy’s fragile coalition government.

A Milan court yesterday found the 76-year-old former prime minister and leader of the People of Liberty party guilty on charges of paying for sex with an underage prostitute, Karima El Mahroug, a Moroccan nightclub dancer, and abuse of office when, as prime minister in 2010, he put pressure on a chief of police to free the teenager from detention on suspicion of theft.

Niccolò Ghedini, Mr Berlusconi’s defence lawyer, called the sentence “beyond logic” and said the former prime minister, now a senator, would appeal. Italy’s judicial system has a lengthy two-stage appeals system and the sentence, if confirmed, will not be enforced until that process is exhausted.