f. Analysis of foreign mafias in Italy Foreign criminal organizations represent a consolidated component in the overall national criminal scenario.

The investigations conducted by the police forces confirm, even in the semester in reference, how the existence of interactions between Italian mafia consorteries and foreign organised criminal groups is increasingly marked and recurring.

For some members, the Court of Cassation has expressed important pronouncements with which it has outlined and enshrined the typical mafia characters both in structure61 and in criminal operating modes62.

It refers to the maxi operation called "family business".

The accusations of the numerous subjects involved were related, for various reasons, to traffic of narcotics, extortion, detention and illegal port of weapons, serious injuries, attempted murder, fraudulent transfer of assets, for many of which the aggravating mafia method was recognized.

Over twenty sentences, for a total of about 120 years of imprisonment.

As in the case of the organized Nigerian consorteries (c.d. cults), which present a high degree of internal structure and replicate all the distinctive traits typical of the mafia in the management of the various controlled criminal assets.

The Court of Cassation has long expressed itself to Chinese, Nigerian and Romanian criminal structures.

activity carried out and results achieved from Investment Directorate Antimativaa

Half-yearly report TO PARLIAMENT Foreign criminal partnerships are the subject of particular investigative attention by all international institutions63, European64 and Italian because they represent a concrete threat to the security of individual member countries65 and Italy.

Among the priorities listed by the European Council are those relating to "high-risk criminal networks66 to human trafficking, migrant trafficking and drug trafficking", areas in which foreign organized crime is perfectly framed because of the character of transnationality typical of these criminal matrices.

The 23 and 24 maggio 2023, at the Europol Headquarters in the Aja, was held the "High-level Operational Conference-HLOC", organized by the "Network @ON to tackle Top Level OCGs and Mafia style structures" on the theme "The threat by High Risk OCGs in the EU: their transnational dimension, main features and the LEAs approach -The threat posed by the EU's high-risk groups: their transnational dimension, the main features and approach of the Police Forces".

On this occasion, the need to implement international cooperation (police and judicial) with a proactive approach that supports contrast activity (from investigations, trials and outside courts) with synergistic involvement of all EU agencies and Member States engaged in the fight against organised and serious crime.

The dynamism and development as well as the level of danger achieved by the numerous and varied foreign sodalicies present in the country imposes on the activity of contrast a global and systemic approach and a consequent broadened vision of the phenomenon.

In this direction it should be understood the path of international cooperation of the "Operative Network Antimafia @ON", of which the DIA is the creator and Project Leader.

The Network is considered in the international context a useful tool to promote a rapid and effective exchange of information in the context of contrast to mafias, even outside Europe.

The main objective of this innovative project is to promote the operational exchange of information and best practices, with the aim of countering the criminal organizations "mafia style" to be considered a dangerous threat to the social and economic security of the EU.

The same objectives were also identified by the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) in the annual publication "2022 INTERPOL Global Crime Trend Summary Report" [Annual publication in which the data collected relating to the trend of global crime, focused on the 5 macro-areas:

Africa, Americas and the Caribbean, Asia and the Pacific, Europe, Middle East and North Africa –https: //www. interpol. int/How-we-work/Criminal-intelligence-analysis2/Our-analysis-reports].

The Council of the European Union, the 26 maggio 2021, has established: "[...] EU priorities for the fight against organized crime and serious forms of crime through the European multidisciplinary platform to combat crime threats (EMPACT) in the period 2022-2025...(omissis)...

On the basis of the EU assessment of the threat represented by organized crime and the serious forms of crime 2021 presented by Europol, Member States have identified 10 priorities in the fight against crime... (omissis) [...]".

Anche EUROPOL ha accolto, tra gli obiettivi della propria attività di prevenzione e contrasto alle gravi forme di criminalità organizzata internazionale, le minacce alla sicurezza comunitaria provenienti dal traffico internazionale di stupefacenti, dal riciclaggio di denaro e dalla tratta di esseri umani [Fonte: https: //www.europol.europa.eu/about-europol: it] Il "Serious and Organised Crime Threat Assessment" (SOCTA) è uno dei rapporti di punta di Europol, poiché aggiorna la comunità delle Forze dell'ordine e i responsabili delle decisioni sugli sviluppi delle gravi forme di criminalità organizzata e sulle minacce che esse rappresentano per l'UE.

Based on the analysis of prevailing threats, SOCTA identifies a number of high priority crime areas on which the operational response in the EU should be focused [source: https: //www.europol.europa.eu/publications-events/main-reports/socta-report].

"Identify and dismantle high-risk criminal networks active in the EU, with particular attention to those using corruption, acts of violence, firearms and money laundering through parallel submerged financial systems."

2. Matrix Matrix The various foreign criminal organizations active throughout the national territory often have different connotations for origins, composition and mode of action.

Compared to their geographical allocation, there is a higher level of independence and criminal autonomy in the northern regions, sometimes in an almost equal position than in local mafias, with which they interact mainly in the field of drugs.

In the central and southern regions, on the other hand, there is an apparent reversal of trend compared to the past.

In fact, while up to a few years ago there has been a prevalent subordination of foreign sodaencies to autochthonous mafia organizations, more recently judicial police activities show a gradual and constant strengthening of foreign criminal groups with a tendency to acquire a greater degree of autonomy than the undisputed rule of local mafias67.

Investigative evidence would seem to confirm the recognition of a certain level of tolerance on the part of the latter, limited to illicit sectors not occupied (or not occupied) by autochthonous mafias that are sometimes given "in concession"68.

In some cases, alliances are recorded for the implementation of specific unlawful affairs, in order to avoid deliberately counterpositions and achieve tacit balances based on territorial distribution and criminal sectors of interest.

The prevailing interest of foreign criminal groups established in Italy continues to be focused on drug trafficking69, although the organisations of Albanian nationalities 70, North African and those from sub-Saharan Africa (Nigeria in primis), with transnational projections in other European countries such as Belgium, Holland and Spain and South America.

The Albanian criminal organizations, in particular, increasingly occupy a comprimary role with representatives of sodalizi di matrice 'ndranghetista, being able to count on the presence of own referents in the main merchant ports of North Europe and South America.

Foreign criminal partnerships in Italy often constitute the outpost of more articulated organizations rooted in the territories of origin such as Africa, East Europe, China and also South America.

On the international level, these organizations are often hegemons in the management of entire illicit chains, which are able to control their

In particular in Sicily but also in Lazio and Abruzzo.

It is the case of the Nigerian consorteries called "cults" and of the organized Albanian criminal groups.

In particular, in drug trafficking, Albanians, Nigerians and North-Africans have confirmed a growing affirmation of their criminal capacities by acquiring important "swimming pools" in unemployed areas, i.e. by autochthonous crime also in large urban centres.

Less structured than the Albanian and Nigerian consorteries, the Tunisian and Moroccan ones are mainly dedicated to the hashish traffic directly produced in the Maghreb countries.

Subjects of magrebine origin also provide retail coverage of all kinds of astounding as the manufacturing of other more structured organizations.

Chinese, Filipino and Bangladese crime is particularly active in methamphetamines, especially Chinese and Filipino crime in the shaboo spaccio (particular synthetic drugs made up of methamphetamine crystals).

Bangladese crime is operational in addition to marijuana and hashish, also in yaba, astonishing synthesis from the Asian market.

The traffic of drugs from the Balkans continues to be managed, mostly, directly by the transnational criminal organizations - especially the Albanian one - thanks to the logistic support of the numerous subjects of Albanian origin now stably resident or domiciled in Puglia, as they have evidenced numerous judicial police activities often carried out in collaboration with the Procura of the "Aquile Country".

In addition, stable interest rates for drug trafficking are now reported, with the 'ndrangheta and the Camorra.

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Half-yearly report AT PARLIAMENT costs making them more competitive in the conclusion of agreements and alliances functional with Italian sodalizi, also of a mafia type.

The presence of foreigners in the field of drugs has a transversal connotation regarding the management of the entire supply chain, from the supply to the street, increasingly entrusted to subjects of different ethnicity often irregular on the territory71.

An emerging phenomenon that arouses particular social alarm is that of the baby gangs, organized bands of minors and neo-greaters composed of violent young people, mostly Salvadoran 72 or Magrebina, who manage small criminal sectors mostly locally and are dedicated to the predatory crimes including the "on-road" robberies, which constitute the most widespread phenomenon.

They acquire, then, more and more significant, by size and danger, the trafficking of human beings (often related to the phenomenon of exploitation of prostitution) and the promotion of illegal immigration, also these to be included among the most profitable business for foreign criminal organizations.

Foreign partnerships have also shown strong interest in computer fraud, demonstrating strong skills and skills in the field of new technologies.

Foreign criminal organizations constantly follow and exploit digital evolution, updating their know-how, while maintaining a strong link with tradition and places of origin (think about the rituals of affiliation of the "Nigerian cults" or the crime of Albanian and Russian origin).