A parliamentary report into the 'ndrangheta says Italy's notorious crime syndicate spreads its tentacles like al-Qaeda and resembles a fast-food chain because of its ability to market its brand as it expands abroad.
The report is the first comprehensive study by parliament's anti-Mafia commission on the 'ndrangheta, a group that came into the spotlight last summer with the killing of six Italians outside a pizzeria in Germany.
It offers solid evidence to claims by investigators that the syndicate has eclipsed the Sicilian Mafia in recent years in power and international reach.
"Today the 'ndrangheta ... is the most modern organization, the most powerful one as far as cocaine trafficking goes," the commission said in a 239-page report, which was released on Wednesday.
It is "the one able to obtain and offer deadly weapons of war and destruction."
The commission report said the 'ndrangheta has reached a "basically exclusive" control over cocaine imports from Colombia, forcing all other criminal organizations, including Sicily's Cosa Nostra, to deal with it if they want to have access to the drug.
Over the decades, the group, originally based in the southern Calabria region, has spread to central and northern Italy, in much of Europe as well as in Argentina, Brazil and Colombia, Morocco, Canada, the US and Australia, the report said.
"In the same way as great fast-food-chains, it offers -- all over the world, in places very different from one another -- the identical, recognizable, reliable brand and the same criminal product," it said.
What sets the 'ndrangheta apart from other crime syndicates, including its equivalent in Sicily, is mostly its structure, which is strictly based on close family ties. This makes the 'ndrangheta less vulnerable to the risk of turncoats, whose testimony has dealt harsh blows to the Mafia in the past years.
The structure also allows for an effective infiltration in other countries.
The 'ndrangheta has developed "like al-Qaeda, with a similar tentacular structure," and without a centralized leadership, the report says.
Feuds between powerful families have proven deadly.
The past summer's slayings of six Italians in Germany were seen as a family vendetta and the latest chapter of the long-standing feud between rival clans.
Last week, the boss of what investigators described as a "ferocious" family in the 'ndrangheta syndicate, Pasquale Condello, was arrested in the regional capital, Reggio Calabria. The man had been on the run for 20 years and was on the police list of Italy's most dangerous fugitives.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un sent Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) greetings with what appeared to be restrained rhetoric that comes as Pyongyang moves closer to Russia and depends less on its long-time Asian ally. Kim wished “the Chinese people greater success in building a modern socialist country,” in a reply message to Xi for his congratulations on North Korea’s birthday, the state-run Korean Central News Agency reported yesterday. The 190-word dispatch had little of the florid language that had been a staple of their correspondence, which has declined significantly this year, an analysis by Seoul-based specialist service NK Pro showed. It said
On an island of windswept tundra in the Bering Sea, hundreds of miles from mainland Alaska, a resident sitting outside their home saw — well, did they see it? They were pretty sure they saw it — a rat. The purported sighting would not have gotten attention in many places around the world, but it caused a stir on Saint Paul Island, which is part of the Pribilof Islands, a birding haven sometimes called the “Galapagos of the north” for its diversity of life. That is because rats that stow away on vessels can quickly populate and overrun remote islands, devastating bird
‘CLOSER TO THE END’: The Ukrainian leader said in an interview that only from a ‘strong position’ can Ukraine push Russian President Vladimir Putin ‘to stop the war’ Decisive actions by the US now could hasten the end of the Russian war against Ukraine next year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday after telling ABC News that his nation was “closer to the end of the war.” “Now, at the end of the year, we have a real opportunity to strengthen cooperation between Ukraine and the United States,” Zelenskiy said in a post on Telegram after meeting with a bipartisan delegation from the US Congress. “Decisive action now could hasten the just end of Russian aggression against Ukraine next year,” he wrote. Zelenskiy is in the US for the UN
A 64-year-old US woman took her own life inside a controversial suicide capsule at a Swiss woodland retreat, with Swiss police on Tuesday saying several people had been arrested. The space-age looking Sarco capsule, which fills with nitrogen and causes death by hypoxia, was used on Monday outside a village near the German border. The portable human-sized pod, self-operated by a button inside, has raised a host of legal and ethical questions in Switzerland. Active euthanasia is banned in the country, but assisted dying has been legal for decades. On the same day it was used, Swiss Department of Home