With the numbers of mafia-related murders on the rise, Italy’s interior minister has called for the army to be sent in.
Clans within the Camorra crime syndicate are involved in an upsurge of violence as they fight over drug dealing territory.
The result has been 10 murders in Naples since the year began, with three victims having been gunned down on the streets in just over 24 hours.
Naples and the surrounding region of Campania is the base for the Camorra which is said to be growing in strength. Each year it brings in tens of millions of euros from drug trafficking, extortion, prostitution and the illegal dumping or burning of toxic waste.
“Right now in Naples we need the army,” said Angelino Alfano, the interior minister and deputy prime minister. “We need to silence the guns.”
He said that in Naples the number of murders is rising while elsewhere in the country crimes are decreasing.
Sending troops to Naples would free up the police, allowing more officers to concentrate on fighting the mafia, he added.
His call drew the support of the city’s mayor and its archbishop.
Although dozens of Camorra bosses are already in jail, they are often replaced by younger, and sometimes more violent, members.
The new generation is “attempting, with total unscrupulousness, to occupy the territory through violence,” said Luigi Riello, the chief prosecutor of Naples.
The Camorra is said to be second in wealth and aggression only to the ’Ndrangheta mafia in Calabria.
The demand for drugs is fuelling the violence and bloodshed and has led to the increasing power of the Camorra, despite being composed of some 100 semi-autonomous clans which continuously battle each other.
