(Newser) – Despite calls for his resignation, Silvio Berlusconi will not step down—or apologize—following reports of his involvement with a 17-year-old belly dancer. His defense: “It’s better to like beautiful girls than to be gay,” Ireland's RTÉ reports. At a motorcycle industry show, he insisted he hadn’t done anything wrong and said he continues to “work without interruption” while, admittedly, “occasionally [looking] a beautiful girl in the face.”



“You should be completely reassured about the government and about the fact that it's a government that still has a majority that intends to govern until the end of its term,” he said. For more on the rumors dogging him, click here.

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