Rome, April 25 (IANS/AKI) The centre-right no longer has any hope of forming a coalition government in Italy, the populist Five Star Movement's leader Luigi Di Maio said on Tuesday after talks with lower house of parliament Speaker Roberto Fico aimed at ending Italy's post-election political stalemate.
"It's clear that a centre-right government is no longer a plausible hypothesis.
"I urge the (centre-left) Democratic Party to come to the negotiating table to see if the conditions exist to work together," he said.
The Democratic Party's acting Secretary Maurizio Martina said on Tuesday after meeting Fico that it would "deepen" exploratory talks on a government with Five-Star "in a spirit of cooperation and without hiding our differences".
Italy's President Sergio Mattarella has asked Fico to hold three days of talks with Five-Star and the Democratic Party to asses the scope for a coalition. He is due to report back to Mattarella on Thursday with his findings.
A previous round of consultations last week between Senate Speaker Maria Elisabetta Alberti Casellati, the centre-right alliance and Five-Star failed owing to Di Maio's refusal to govern with the far-right League party's conservative ally Forza Italia due to its leader Silvio Berlusconi's tax fraud conviction and current bribery trial.
The conservative alliance including the League and Forza Italia won the most seats in last month's polls and Five-Star became the largest party in the hung parliament, while the Democratic Party has enough seats to play kingmaker.
The Democratic Party is divided over a possible tie-up with Five-Star - many of its lawmakers oppose the idea and believe the party should go into opposition after losing the election. It had governed Italy since 2013.
--IANS/AKI
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