Mafia 'struck secret deal with Italian politicians to end murder campaign' Dell'Utri, who awaits a final Supreme Court verdict on a separate conviction for ties to the Sicilian mafia, has worked with Mr Berlusconi since the 1970s, helping him form his Forza Italia political movement in 1993. A mafia turncoat, Gaspare Spatuzza, has claimed a senior boss told him Mr Berlusconi held talks with the mob about stopping the bombings before he entered politics. He claimed Dell'Utri, who has denied all the allegations, was Mr Berlusconi's intermediary. Mancino, who has served as head of the Italian senate as well as interior minister, is accused of lying to investigators, but said as the trial opened that he did not deserve to be tried alongside mobsters. "I have always fought the mafia, I cannot stay in the same trial in which there are mafiosi," he said. The opening of the trial coincided with the 20th anniversary of the 1993 mafia attack on Florence, when a Fiat packed with explosives was parked near the Uffizi Gallery, killing five and destroying paintings at the Gallery. The bombings ultimately ushered in a crackdown on Cosa Nostra, which had prospered for years thanks to protection from politicians who received bulk votes from godfathers. Today the Mafia is considered to be less powerful than the Calabrian 'Ndrangheta, which has supplanted the Sicilans in the South American drug trade. Riina was captured and jailed in 1993, while the man many believe replaced him at the helm of Cosa Nostra, Bernardo Provenzano, was captured in a farmhouse in Sicily in 2006. Due to poor health, Provenzano will face separate proceedings for his role in the the alleged collusion between the Mafia and the state, while former government minister Calogero Mannino has opted for a separate, fast track trial. Magistrates have meanwhile demanded that Mori - the alleged police negotiator -- be jailed for nine years in a separate probe for allegedly deliberately delaying the arrest of Provenzano, who escaped arrest for 43 years. The trial was promptly adjourned to Friday following procedural request by prosecutors and defence lawyers.