Italy PM says government must not depend on Berlusconi legal problems

ROME (Reuters) - Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta said on Wednesday that the government's survival must be separated from the legal troubles of center-right leader Silvio Berlusconi and that its collapse could be "fatal" for the country. In a speech preceding a confidence vote in the Senate, he asked the Senate to support his administration, arguing that a recovery from the country's longest recession in six decades would be put at risk by a government crisis. A new election would not solve anything, he said, because it could lead to another political deadlock like the one that followed the February national election and that lead to the formation of his right-left coalition government in April. (Reporting by Steve Scherer)