ROME: A long-running battle between Silvio Berlusconi and the Italian judiciary flared up again on Thursday as the main magistrates’ association held demonstrations in courtrooms to protest the premier’s latest attack on prosecutors and judges. Berlusconi has a history of legal woes stemming from his business interests in Milan before he entered politics in the mid-1990s. He lashed out on Tuesday at what he said were communist judges and prosecutors intent on destroying him. The judges’ association branded the comments “groundless and ridiculous” and threatened a strike as judges and prosecutors gathered in protest in courtrooms in Milan and Rome.