Mr. Von Däniken, Ladies and Gentlemen,
first of all I would like to welcome you to Rome on behalf of myself and of the Director of SISDe and to thank you for your partecipation to the first European Meeting on organised crime.
Just to make clear my usage of words I'd like to tell you in advance that when I talk about "meeting" I mean the whole event, including the social moments.
When I use the term "seminar" I refer to the cultural and professional aspects of the programme: lectures, case analyses, discussions, questions and answers prepared by the working groups.
The meeting is the result of a decision made by the Working Group on organised crime and of the request which Mr. Von Däniken, Chairman of the Committee and Director of BuPo, addressed to the Head of SISDe after the agreement among the Directors. Mr. Marino accepted to organise the seminar and we met with Mr. Von Däniken on the 10th of January in Bern. Then I was charged with organising the seminar.
Even though I have not had a great amount of time at my disposal, I tried to fulfill my task keeping always in my mind the main targets of the initiative which has brought you here in Rome. They are:
1) to promote mutual acquaintance and good relations among Services' officers;
2) to share as wide knowledge as possible about criminal phenomena and contrasting strategies within the list of the main interests that your Services proposed to us in their messages;
3) to favour co-operation and future exchanges of useful information among Services on the subject, through their officers.
I have to add that if we want to achieve these purposes, all of us should be convinced that "organised crime" is a real threat to the security of our countries. It is an appalling threat which widely justifies the employment of intelligence activities against it.
The seriousness and width of the threat posed by O.C. are the result of widespread underestimation and misunderstanding of the causes for its development in modern times.
For instance, we know that illegal economy can bring about, along with its harmful breaking of free market rules, even positive effects to the whole economy of a Country.
Nevertheless we have to fight it because in the long run it will cause chaos and mistrust, leading a country out of control.
Organised crime is an epidemical disease which can affect each country weakening its sovereignty.
Its only target is profit and obviously the largest profits are searched in wealthy nations.
The old image of the "mafioso" wearing the Sicilian cap, the black velvet jacket and carrying on the shoulder a cut double-barrelled gun is over.
We believe that State-nations may win this non-conventional war only by organising themselves better than the best organised criminal associations.
We are here to give a valuable contribution to our Community in order to pursue the main target of our Services that is a closer co-operation.
Now it could be useful for me to spend a few words on the working sessions of the programme.
We will start on Wednesday the 26th. There will be three days of hard and dynamic work: brief lectures, round tables, debates, meetings of the working groups, questions and answers.
The first working day will be devoted to the analysis of the criminal phenomena which originate from Italy: threat evaluation, activities, and contrasting strategies.
The programme of the second day aims at widening the knowledge of the main foreign criminal organisations now spreading throughout Europe.
Three important operations carried out against criminal organisations with a fundamental intelligence contribution will be examined on the third and final day of the Seminar.

Rome, April 24 1995