In my little speech yesterday in Palermo I stressed the fact that, whilst we were honouring two noble and courageous local causes, the problems they were addressing – poverty and organised crime – were problems all of Europe had to face. As if to echo these sentiments, today’s edition of the Financial Times carries an article explaining how the ‘Mafia rushed to fresh profits through gap in the Berlin Wall’. According to the report, the Mafia (and other criminal organisations) saw the end of the Cold War and the fall of the Iron Curtain as a major investment opportunity and was not slow to profit. This also confirmed a theme Don Ciotti vigorously stressed. ‘There are those who say that the mafia is something of a benign organisation because the money it extorts is fed back into the local communities; not at all! not at all!’
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