Copy Link
Add to Bookmark
Report
NuKE Issue 06-010
================================================================================
Volume 1, Issue 6, May 1993
NuKE Info-Journal #6
NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE
uK E-
KE "Mafia, Incorporated." -N
E- Italy's underworld extends its reach Nu
-N uK
Nu By KE
uK The Godfather E-
KE -N
E-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-NuKE-Nu
Like any business bursting at the seams of its own success, the Mafia
and its allies know no borders. Born of a transatlantic axis, the Mafia
has forged alliances wherever it has needed to, sponsoring indigenous crime
syndicates or helping rivals to wipe each other out. The manipulation of the
Turkish heroin "Babas" or the drug barons of Colombia has become a model of
how to operate an empire to the conquering power's advantage. Internationally,
the Mafia is stronger than ever before, recent attempts of the crackdown show
it to be expanding with speed, in Russia and other post-communist countries,
buying up chunks of the economy, laundering money, dealing with local
gangsters, and preparing to create and cultivate an eager market for hard drugs.
The Mafia runs the world's drug-dealing business, and its wealth is
inestimable. The giddy profits from South America, the US, and the Far East
are laundered, recycled, and hidden by the best wizards in the money business
across an impenetrable labyrinth of `legal' commercial activities.
"They would do well to go to Havard Business School." says Leoluca Orlando, the
ousted anti-Mafia mayor of Palermo, Sicily. This statement is probably true,
however it may be hard to put to the test! Because to `protect' the empire, the
Mafia must kill. And however wide its intercontinental span, it kills mainly
on its own ground and at its nerve centre, where it has, until now, enjoyed
relative impunity: in Italy.
A bombing last year this time (May 1992) killed Judge Giovanni Falcone, one
of the few men _ever_ to momentarily check the squalid advance of the Mafia.
Mr. Falcone, was quoted as "The worlds _most_ wanted man!", wanted that is by
the Mafia. Mr. Falcone did contain assortments of documentation and knowledge,
on the Mafia structures, therefore possing a great threat to the Mafia, and
killed by the Mafia. After the killing of Mr. Falcone, who was one of the
world's _most_ protect man. Who, was to challenge the Mafia and continue Mr.
Falcone's work?
Two months later, a `fake' construction crew pretending to repair a segment,
of the highway, placed a bomb under that segment of the `repaired' road. The
bomb was set off just as Paolo Borsellino, passed underneath it in his limo.
Paolo Borsellino had _secretly_ taken over from Falcone as head of the
Anti-Mafia group in Palermo. How did the Mafia find out so quickly? The Mafia
contains extremely loyal men, in almost all levels of the government, and
someone tipped the Mafia that Mr. Borsellino was heading a new Anti-Mafia
government agency in Rome. With this simple message of triumphant monkery,
the Mafia confirmed that it will wage its latest, and potentially its
bloodiest, battle against Italian society with a sick blend of fury and cool,
diabolical arrogance.
This time the Mafia's violence is not between clans, nor is it the _usual_
picking off of inconvenient politicians and judges at intervals of years. This
time the offensive opposition and terrorizing a rebelling populace back into
submission. Following Borsellino's assassination, the Italian authorities
sent in troops for the first time against the Cosa Nostra. Nobody _ever_ dared
to go against the Cosa Nostra! The Cosa Nostra has grown from what was believed
to be a band of gangster operating out of the chaos of postwar Sicily, to
become, in 47 years, an unchallenged and unchallengeable global crime
syndicate. The officials and troops are shadowboxing, and judges have resigned,
saying that their work is pointless, their lives are undefended, and their
investigations are blocked from on high. The killers of Falcone and Borsellino
want to show that they can kill with impunity and that they are protected from
within the system.
Almost _every_ time the judiciary peels away the covers of Italian high finance,
construction, tourist development, local politics, or public-sector spending
excesses, it finds the Mafia. Every illegal arms deal and, of course, every
drug haul leads directly to the Mafia.
There seems to be no obvious explanation for its success other than ruthless
cruelty, unfettered greed, friends in high places, and the perpetuation of
the picturesque and bogus mythology in which the Mafia's squalid operation is
gift-wrapped for hollywood and young inmates alike. The `super-boss' of this
awesome empire, on the run since 1969 and the world's most wanted man is
Salvatore `Don Toto' Riina, head of the clan from Corleone, the town that
gave its name to Francis Ford Coppola's glitzy `Godfather' clan. Riina was the
right-hand man to Luciano Liggio, who was arrested on a night in 1973 while
reading Kant's `Critique of Pure Reason' and has been imprisoned ever since.
Liggio had built up the Corleone clan, the main victors of the Mafia was of
1981-83 that left defeated clans obliged to work as clients, subject to
Corleone approval.
Riina and his partner, Bernardo Provezano, known as `The Beasts' carried out
Liggio's orders. Riina is wanted for ordering some 150 murders and is said to
have committed 40 himself. They were the founders of the empire.
Perhaps most extraordinary, Riina is the man whom authorities believe finally
subjugated the New York wing of the Mafia not only to Sicily but to his clan.
Authorities also confirm that the Corleone clan manages the affairs of the
Sicilian's long-standing colony in South America, notably in Venezuela. The
Cuntrera and Caruana families from Agrigento, are now prime managers of
South America's current cocaine surplus.
The most resent meet ever to be recorded by the authorities took place on
Valentine's Day 1989, there was a meeting at the Elysee hotel in Nice of
members of a consortium comprising the Sicilian Mafia, the giant Mafia,
the octopus, along with two divans of the Italian crime empire: the
Calabrian and the Camorra of Naples. Representatives of the Colombian and
Venezuelan cartels were also present. The outcome of this meeting was an
alliance and a carving up of the trade bringing heroin from East and
cocaine from the South America. By and large, the Sicilians kept the heroin
routes and a footheld in the white-power trade, the Calabrians won a lucrative
client role in heroin, and the Camorra emerged as the specialists in cocaine.
The Camorra's international interests span South America and Spanish and French
Rivieras. It has drug peddling bases in Holland and Germany.
For the first time, the Mafia faces a new enemy: its own subjects. The
rebellion appeared in the last few years, when Leoluca Orlando, mayor of
Palermo, promised to confront the Cosa Nostra. He _did_ expelled the Mafia
from city hall. The revolt went on, Libero Grassi, a businessman in Capo D'
Orlando, refused to pay his small protection fee; he was shot as a lesson
to others. The two judges killed (Falcone & Borsellino) provoked a street
rebellion(s), general strikes, and the biggest demonstration in Italy's
history.
The fear of violence has lead to the European Community (EC) to find back!
Europol, the European Police, until recently had been nothing more than a
harmless paper thing. But this was to change starting January 1st, 1993.
Today, Riina is located at Rebibbia prison in Rome, where interrogation has
already begun. So far, Riina has refused to cooperate with his captors, who
nevertheless say that he is behaving `with the politeness of a Sicilian that
does not exit any more. Riina was arrested in Palermo, Sicily in February,
1993. During the period of surveillance, Riina met with politicians of the
highest level, which began soon after the assassination of judge Giovanni
Falcone.
Organized crime has long operated internationally, with no boundaries, perhaps
Europol was exactly what is needed, a police force with no boundaries? And was
Europol the result of Riina being captured. Many would disagree. Nevertheless
the Mafia continues, with or without Riina.
1993 will be a dreadful year for the Mafia, it is yet to end. One of the
`Big' players is gone, Riina, what happens now?
"L'appetito viene mangiando"
Translation: Eating makes you hungry.
The Mafia, already fed to bursting, remains very hungry indeed.
================================================================================
