ROME (AFP) - Italy's highest court partially cleared former seven-time prime minister Giulio Andreotti of colluding with the Mafia but failed to remove lingering doubts about any links before 1980.
The ruling upheld a May 2003 appeal ruling, and brings to end more than a decade of legal proceedings against Andreotti, who is now 85.
But it fell short of a full acquittal to clear the name of the grand old man of Italian politics who towered over the country's post-war domestic scene for half a century.
Friday's ruling effectively rejected an appeal brought by prosecutors after Andreotti was cleared by a court of appeal in Palermo in May 2003 of cultivating ties with the Sicilian Mafia.
But like the May ruling, it made a clear distinction between events prior to and after 1980, suggesting Andreotti had fostered friendly ties with the Mafia before 1980, a period which is now outside the statue of limitations.
The earlier Palermo court's ruling -- a massive 1,520 pages in six volumes -- suggested Andreotti had maintained some "friendly ties" with Cosa Nostra mobster bosses in Sicily up until June 6, 1980.
These ties "had not translated into actions" however and no evidence of criminal fault could be found, it said.
In the previous appeal, which confirmed a 1999 acquittal, the Palermo court also said there was no evidence that Andreotti had links with the Mafia after 1980.
Andreotti would have faced house arrest if convicted in Friday's ruling. He is too old to go to prison under Italian law.
A prime minister seven times between 1972 and 1992 and a government minister 21 times, he fell out of public favour in the 1990s when a series of corruption scandals hit his now-defunct Christian Democrat party, which had until then dominated Italian post-war politics.
But the slightly stooped, bespectacled Andreotti is now a senator-for-life and remains Italy's most prominent -- if not controversial -- elder statesmen and a regular on political chat shows.
Dubbed "Mr Indestructible", he has weathered a squall of convictions over the past few years as anti-Mafia investigators have picked apart his decades at the pinnacle of Italian politics.
He was cleared a year ago by the top court of involvement in the murder of a Sicilian journalist when a court overturned a 24-year conviction for ordering a Mafia hit on him.
The apparent watershed vis a vis the Mafia was triggered on June 6, 1980, according to the Palermo court documents, with the mob killing of president of the Sicilian region Piersanti Matarella.
This sparked a personal committment from Andreotti to step up the fight against organized crime with tougher legislation.