Italy’s top anti-corruption prosecutors have slammed the government for almost ignoring the mafia “emergency”, saying officials are focusing their attention on immigration and EU issues instead, The Local Italy reports.
Mafia is alive and sound, say the Italian prosecutors, adding that ‘Ndrangheta mafia is the only organised crime group operating on all of the world’s continents. The criminalists warn Conte’s government that mafia even is spreading.
“The ‘Ndrangheta is the only mafia present on all continents: western Europe, North America, Central and South America, Africa and now it’s spreading to Eastern Europe”, Nicola Gratteri told during his book presentation in Rome.
Being a prosecutor in Catanzaro in Calabria, the 60-year-old Nicola Gratteri has been under police protection since 1989. On Tuesday, he presented his book “The Secret History of the ‘Ndrangheta”, co-authored with mafia expert Antonio Nicaso, who teaches in Canada and the US.
According to Gratteri, Ndrangheta’s members aren’t politically left or right despite their partaking in the government business, the mafia is just present wherever there’s money and power to manage. That is why Europe should be convinced of the ‘Ndrangheta’s structural presence in their countries otherwise there is no progress in the fight against them.
Nowadays, the mafia does two things in Europe: i) sell cocaine, and ii) wash dirty money buying whatever is for sale. Thus, today that means cafes, pizzerias or hotels, but tomorrow it could be the shares in television channels or media, so, that they can influence public opinion, Gratteri explains. While there isn’t yet specific anti-mafia legislation in Italy and the EU, mafia used to seek out tax and judicial havens.
The fight against organised crime requires using intelligence services, which are instead preoccupied with terrorism, a mafia expert Antonio Nicaso said. “Terrorist activity is a big cause for concern to society but not mafioso activity. So we fight terrorism but we should be fighting both at once,” he added.
