The Mafia's turnover is thought to be more than 200 billion ($319.5 billion) despite Italy's efforts to prosecute Mob leaders like Michele Zagaria, who was arrested in 2011 after being on the run from 1995. Photo / AP
The combined turnover of Italy's Mafia groups has now overtaken that of the European Union's budget as the Mob spreads its tendrils overseas, a senior government adviser has warned.
Giovanni Brauzzi, the security policy director at the Italian Foreign Ministry, has claimed that the Mob's annual income had now passed
the 200 billion ($319.5 billion) mark, compared with a total EU spend of 140 billion.
Speaking at a conference in Brussels, Brauzzi also underlined the international dimension of Italian organised crime groups, including Sicily's Cosa Nostra, the Calabria-based 'Ndrangheta and the Camorra of the Naples area. "They invest only 10 per cent of this budget in Italy; the rest they invest in countries in Europe and elsewhere. They have good friends everywhere."
Organised crime has infiltrated "the most important companies working in financial transactions", added Brauzzi.
The news comes as the centre-right Forza Italia party, led by disgraced former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, was this week accused of trying to kill a bill aimed at halting the Mafia's ability to sell votes in the south of Italy to corrupt politicians.
