Govt to deploy 800 more mafia fighters in Calabria

To combat powerful 'Ndrangheta mafia

(ANSA) - Rome, April 23 - The government will deploy an extra 800 agents to fight the Calabria-based 'Ndrangheta mafia, State Police Chief Alessandro Pansa and Interior Minister Angelino Alfano said Wednesday.

The deployment comes under a national plan of action to fight crime in the southern Calabria region, where the 'Ndrangheta has become more powerful than the Naples-based Camorra and the Sicilian Cosa Nostra due to its stranglehold on the European cocaine trade. Of the extra law enforcers, 155 will be assigned to investigative teams and 355 will be on patrol. The remaining 290 are still to be assigned, Pansa said.