Huge catch of net.
Italy headed Wednesday a vast international police operation in the peninsula, in Germany, Spain and Romania against the 'Ndrangheta, the Calabrian mafia, for which some thirty arrest warrants were issued.
The operation called PLATINUM-DIA against the 'Ndrangheta, unveiled Wednesday morning by the National Directorate of Anti-Mafia Investigations (DIA), targets two clans of this Mafia, the Agresta family and the Giorgi family, the latter accused of trafficking in international drug, in several regions in Italy and Germany.
"More than 200" members of the DIA, "a hundred" police and gendarmes, supported by helicopters and dog-loving units as well as a military regiment, were mobilized on Italian territory, while "500 agents" took part. in the three other countries, specified the Italian investigators headed by the public prosecutor's office of Turin (North).
Johannes George Roth, prosecutor of Constance in Germany, said for his part that 33 arrest warrants were issued for this operation: three in Germany and thirty in Italy, and that more than 80 searches were carried out.
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According to him, the 'Ndrangheta imported "hundreds of kg of cocaine from the Netherlands to Italy" and organized a large-scale "tax evasion" in Germany through companies selling foodstuffs to thousands of bars and restaurants. Italian restaurants in Germany.
“Today's investigation is a model of cooperation” between magistrates and police, welcomed the national anti-mafia prosecutor Federico Cafiero de Raho at a press conference.
La'Ndrangheta, one of the most powerful mafias in the world
Denouncing the "great danger" of the 'Ndrangheta, he pleaded in favor of a "global intervention, not only at the European level" which would allow the police to control the criminal groups who regularly use "communication networks. encrypted ”. Numerous receiverships of assets worth “many millions of euros” were made as part of this operation.
Maurizio Vallone, director of the DIA, clarified that weapons had also been found during searches in Turin, proving that the 'Ndrangheta "does not only engage in economic activities but also in intimidating, violent activities". This "major new operation against drug trafficking and money laundering" was supported by Eurojust, the European judicial cooperation unit, and Europol, the European police agency, the two organizations also said in a press release. common.
It is part of a DIA project, Project ONNET, funded by the European Union and whose objective "is to fight mafia criminal groups in Europe organized on the model of the mafia," the statement said. Calabrian La'Ndrangheta has long overtaken the Sicilian Cosa Nostra as Italy's largest mafia organization and is considered one of the most powerful crime syndicates in the world due to its control over most of the world. cocaine entering Europe.
