Italian PM Giorgia Meloni has separated from her television journalist partner Andrea Giambruno. File
| Photo Credit: AFP

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said on Friday she had separated from her television journalist partner Andrea Giambruno, who has drawn criticism in recent weeks for sexist comments made on and off air.

“My relationship with Andrea Giambruno, which lasted almost 10 years, ends here,” PM Meloni wrote on her social media accounts. “Our paths have diverged for some time, and the time has come to acknowledge it,” she added.

The couple have a seven-year-old daughter.

Mr. Giambruno is the presenter of a news programme transmitted by Mediaset, part of the MFE media group owned by the heirs of the late Silvio Berlusconi, the former premier and Meloni ally.

On two days this week, another Mediaset show broadcast off-air excerpts from Mr. Giambruno’s programme showing him using foul language and appearing to make advances to a female colleague.

“Why didn’t I meet you before?”, he tells her.

In the second, more explicit recording aired on Thursday, Mr. Giambruno is heard boasting about an affair and telling female colleagues they can work for him if they take part in group sex.

The TV journalist had already been widely criticised in August for apparent victim-blaming comments following a gang rape case.

“If you go dancing, you have every right to get drunk – there shouldn’t be any kind of misunderstanding and any kind of problem – but if you avoid getting drunk and losing your senses, you might also avoid running into certain problems and coming across a wolf,” he said during his programme.

PM Meloni had said after that episode that she should not be judged for comments made by her partner, and that in future she would not answer questions about his behaviour.

The partner of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has sparked outrage with his controversial comments on rape. While commenting on the gang-rape of a young woman, TV presenter Andrea Giambruno, said women could avoid sexual assaults if they ”do not get too drunk”, the Guardian reported. 

”If you go dancing you are fully entitled to get drunk … but if you avoid getting drunk and losing consciousness, perhaps you’d also avoid getting into trouble because then you’ll find the wolf,” Andrea Giambruno said on his show on channel Rete 4 while discussing recent gang-rapes in the country. 

During the show, he also agreed with the editor of the rightwing Libero newspaper, Pietro Senaldi, who said, “If you want to avoid rape, above all don’t lose consciousness, keep your wits about you.”

His opinion has now sparked political outrage in Italy, as well as a row on social media. 

”They just can’t help but blame women. Don’t go out alone, don’t go where it’s dark, don’t dress provocatively. All this is no longer acceptable,” said Cecilia D’Elia, a senator with the opposition Partito Democratico.

“If a girl drinks too much, she can expect a headache, not a rape,” she added.

The opposition Five Star Movement party (M5S) said in a statement that “Giambruno’s words are unacceptable and shameful” and “they represent a male-dominated and retrograde culture”.

However, Mr Giambruno denied victim blaming and said his comments had been taken out of context, reported BBC. “I never said men are free to rape women who are drunk,” he explained, adding that he had prefaced his remarks by stressing that it was an “abominable act carried out by beasts”.

“If I had said something wrong, I would have apologised, but that’s not the case and there will never be a day when a politician tells me what to say.

“I said rape is an abominable act. I took the liberty of telling young people not to go out on purpose to get drunk and do drugs. I advised them to be careful because, unfortunately, the bad guys are always out there. I never said that men are entitled to rape drunk women.”

Mr Giambruno has a seven-year-old daughter with Prime Minister Meloni. Meanwhile, the PM has not yet commented on the recent rapes or her partner’s statements.