The ‘Ndrangheta, rooted in the southern region of Calabria, has surpassed Sicily’s more famous Cosa Nostra to become Italy’s most powerful mafia group, which operates across the world.
Here are five things to know about the organised crime group, as more than 350 alleged members and their associates go on trial this week.
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“As the days go by, the horror of the ongoing assault on our democracy perpetrated by this President is intensified and so is the immediate need for action.”
Trump was already impeached once by the Democratic-controlled House — in December 2019 for pressuring the leader of Ukraine to dig up political dirt on Joe Biden.
He was acquitted by the Republican-majority Senate.
Though time is running short, Democrats likely have the votes in the House to impeach Trump again and could even draw some Republican support for the move.
But they are unlikely to muster the two-thirds majority needed to convict Trump in the 100-member Senate and remove him from office.
Trump’s successor Joe Biden is due to be inaugurated on January 20.
Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski said Friday that President Donald Trump should resign, making her the first Republican senator to say he should leave office as backlash grows against his goading of violent supporters who stormed the Capitol.
I want him to resign. I want him out. He has caused enough damage,” Murkowski told the Anchorage Daily News.
Murkowski told the newspaper that if the GOP doesn’t cut ties with Trump, she might leave the party. “If the Republican Party has become nothing more than the party of Trump, I sincerely question whether this is the party for me,” she said.
The four-term senator is one of Congress’ more moderate Republicans and has long had a fraught relationship with her party. Even so, her vehement break with Trump underscores the burgeoning desire of Democrats and some Republicans to force him from office, even as his term expires Jan. 20 with the inauguration of Democrat Joe Biden.
There is growing momentum among House Democrats to impeach Trump for a second time as early as next week. Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., has said Vice President Mike Pence and the Cabinet should use the 25th Amendment to force Trump from office. Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., has said he would consider voting to remove Trump should the House approve impeachment articles.
Murkowski said Trump should leave if he’s not going to do his job. She cited his announcement that he would skip Biden’s inauguration and his inattention to the COVID-19 pandemic, saying, “He’s either been golfing, or he’s been inside the Oval Office fuming.”
She added, “He needs to get out. He needs to do the good thing, but I don’t think he’s capable of doing a good thing.”
Murkowski’s interview came after Republicans lost a pair of Senate runoff elections in Georgia that will give Democrats control of that chamber. The new breakdown is 50–50 but tips to Democrats with Vice President-elect Kamala Harris’ tiebreaking vote.
In a speech outside the White House on Wednesday, Trump spurred a crowd of supporters to head to the Capitol, where their attack resulted in five deaths and widespread damage and forced lawmakers to flee the building.
The storming occurred as Congress was meeting for its usually routine certification of electoral votes in the presidential race, which Trump has fallaciously claimed was marred by widespread fraud. His groundless assertions have been rejected by Democratic and Republican state officials across the country and by scores of state and federal courts, including the conservative-dominated Supreme Court.
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Murkowski has clashed repeatedly with Trump, helping kill his 2017 effort to repeal former President Barack Obama’s health care law. When she lost her Republican primary for Senate in 2010, she was reelected as a write-in candidate in the general election despite opposition from Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., the current Senate majority leader who was minority leader at the time.
Criminologist Anna Sergi, of the University of Essex in England, says the group’s name has Greek origins — the word “andranghateia” refers to a “society of men of honour”, and “andrangatho” means “to do military actions”.
The group has only been classed as mafia under Italian law since 2010, but it dates back at least to the unification of Italy in 1861.
It came to public prominence in the 1980s and 1990s in a series of kidnappings across Italy, and affiliates are believed to have been responsible for kidnapping oil tycoon John Paul Getty’s grandson.
- Main activities -
Judge Roberto Di Bella, who has almost 30 years of experience in the methods of the Calabrian mob, describes the ‘Ndrangheta as “perhaps the most powerful criminal organisation in the world, but certainly the most diffuse, and present on five continents”.
Its activities include those typical of organised crime groups — drug trafficking, extortion, illegal waste trafficking and money laundering.
But what makes the ‘Ndrangheta different from other mafia groups is its family structure — it is based on blood ties, which makes it “very reliable, because there are few turncoats”, Di Bella told AFP.
This is one of the reasons why Colombian or Mexican drugs producers have used the ‘Ndrangheta to sell in Europe.
“The enormous flow of money that comes from drugs allows the ‘Ndrangheta to buy everything — businesses, restaurants — to pollute the economy not just of Italy but of many other countries in the world,” he said.
- How much is it worth? -
The Italian authorities estimate there are around 20,000 ‘Ndrangheta members around the world, but its true make-up and wealth are difficult to establish.
Nicola Gratteri, a leading prosecutor in Calabria, estimates the group generates an annual turnover of more than 50 billion euros ($61 billion) — much of it from cocaine trafficking.
- German massacre -
While usually operating under the radar, the activities of the ‘Ndrangheta were thrown into the spotlight in a massacre outside a pizzeria in the German town of Duisburg in 2007.
Six rival clan members were killed as part of a long-running feud between families from the town of Calabria’s San Luca. Sixteen people have been killed in fighting between the families in the ‘Ndrangheta bastion since the 1990s.
- Fed to the pigs -
The ‘Ndrangheta is “feared for its ferocity and its cruelty”, according to Gratteri, who has lived under police protection for the past three decades.
The stories of the violence perpetuated by members are legion, but one particularly grisly one emerged days ahead of this week’s trial.
Maria Chindamo, a 42-year-old businesswoman from Calabria, was reportedly murdered and her body fed to pigs in 2016 after refusing to give up her land to a neighbour with ties to the group.
The ‘Ndrangheta, as well as other mafia groups, has also been blamed for the deaths of dozens of children since the 1950s.
They include three-year-old Nicola “Coco” Campolongo, who was shot in the head in 2014 by gunmen targeting his grandfather.
That same year, on a visit to Calabria, Pope Francis called on Catholics to fight against the ‘Ndrangheta, declaring the group “excommunicated”.
