News Corp sees fair competition boosting Italy TV

MILAN (Reuters) - TV and publishing group News Corp sees fair competition in the Italian TV sector as favoring viewers, according to News's Chief Executive for Europe and Asia James Murdoch on Thursday.

Murdoch, who is also chairman of News Corp's Italian satellite pay-TV unit Sky Italia, made his comments in the text of a speech at a gala dinner for Italian advertisers and entrepreneurs.

"Competition favoring customers based on transparency and in the framework of Italian and European norms is making Italy a better country while competition carried out in any other way without these rules makes exactly the opposite," he said.

"We are proud of being able to carry this competition in Italy where 5 million families have replied positively. Fair competition is an essential element in a dynamic society," he said in the text of the speech.

Media commentators see a clash between News Corp owner and chairman Rupert Murdoch, father of James, and Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister who owns the mainly free-to-air broadcaster Mediaset SpA.

In particular, Sky Italia has suffered a doubling in value added tax on its services. Last week, L'Espresso weekly said the way terrestrial digital TV is being introduced in Italy is likely to penalize Sky Italia's growth.

In the last few weeks Berlusconi has accused Murdoch of mounting a personal attack on him via articles in News Corp-owned The Times newspaper detailing the controversy over his friendship with an 18-year-old aspiring model and said the items were linked to the value tax issue.

Murdoch has dismissed the allegations saying he does not control his editors.

Thursday, businessman Tarak Ben Ammar, a Mediobanca SpA director and friend of Murdoch, said he did not believe Murdoch had launched a campaign against Berlusconi.