1. Introduction
The collapse of the Soviet Union and the labour pains of the Republics born from its break-up seem to be the result of the interaction of various socio-political factors, and even of wrong economic decisions.
The internal political crisis and the ensuing conflicts have complicated a situation that, optimistically, Kozirev, the Russian Foreign Minister, had defined as being near to "a new level of integration".
After almost three years, the C.S.I. (Community of Independent States) does not seem able to foster an improvement of the situation.
Furthermore, the economic situation appears to be very complex: the damages caused by decades of centralised planning have been amplified by the reform policies of Perestrojka.
The Russian Federation with about 150 million inhabitants is going through a serious political, social, but mainly, economic crisis.
The salaries cannot guarantee an acceptable standard of living any longer and the income of the higher classes is 35 times that of the lower classes.
Production has had a fluctuation of 30%, the rouble has lost a third of its buying power even if inflation is stabilised at around 10%.
In an attempt to restore the situation new rules on the economic relations with the other republics have been enforced. However, border crossing and the new tariffs on energy resources have brought recession into the other republics increasing, therefore, the crisis factors within the Community of Independent States.

2. Notes on crime in the U.S.S.R. before perestrojka
The aforesaid socio-political and economic situation has provided a natural habitat for the proliferation of organised crime.
However, the phenomenon defined as "organised crime" is probably the logic development of a society being transformed.
During the Soviet system, the economic activities in the private sector developed outside the rigid rules of the system of centralised planning.
In this context, the "black market" and the "grey market" constituted the most suitable means for obtaining what the official market could not distribute.
Trafficking in drugs, pornographic material and in goods and foreign currency stemmed from the completely illegal black market.
The grey market, supplying goods and services in competition with the official one, but at market prices, had brought about the corruption of public officials.
The behaviour of public Authorities had generated in people the conviction that the law should be complied with only as far as it suited personal interests. This favoured a sort of personal initiative which resulted in robberies, thefts, frauds, and economic and currency crimes.
According to some statistics in the U.S.S.R. from 1961, the year in which a new criminal code was enforced, to 1987 1/3 of the 24 million people condemned (for the police over 35 million) became repeated offenders. More than 70% of the wrongdoings were crimes against property.
Of the two million existing homeless, more than 300,000 had been subjected to criminal sanctions.
In February '89 (for the first time since 1933), the U.S.S.R. made the statistics on crime for the period 1987- 88 public.
These widely incomplete statistics showed an increase of 44.4% in robberies, and of 42.8% in thefts. Other crimes against property had increased by 36.6% (548,524). Homicides had increased by 14.1% and personal damages had reached quota 37,191. In 1988, 17,658 women had been raped, and 183,953 minors had been arrested for having committed crimes. Strangely enough, the headings "drugs" and "prostitution" were missing.

3. The evolution of organised crime in the Community of Independent States
In the evolution of organised crime, the failure to transform the planned economy into a market economy is a crucial element.
It is generally believed that, apart from the objective economic difficulties, the following factors contributed in determining the failure of the new Soviet politics:
- the nomenclature, worried about losing the privileges enjoyed in the management of the enormous financial resources;
- the industrial military complex, always central in the socio-political and economic choices.
Undermined and hindered in many ways, Gorbaciov's economic project gave way to a dangerous race to accumulate wealth. The year 1987, in fact, saw the rise of a myriad of private businesses, firms, associations, and holding companies, which had as main objective the laundering of unlawful profits.
Furthermore, under Eltsin's presidency, privatisations have caused noticeable flows of illegal capital to enter a market, substantially, without rules.
a. Common organised crime and the one tied to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
In a system of rigid centralisation as the Soviet one was, it was natural that tight relations between organised crime and political esponents existed.
We can draw professional crime and the one linked to the political power as two intersecting circles with a central part in common, while the lateral sectors are different and separate.
It is, in fact, probable that Soviet organised crime, with no opportunity to establish "foreign"relations, developed through collusion with elements of the bureaucratic apparatus or of the police forces.
Perestrojka has not been able to cut such ties probably for the following reasons: the wide power of high bureaucrats to participate in economic activities, both legal and illegal; the lack of an effective control on public powers which has allowed the distraction of capital aimed at public interest activities; the deep and widespread economic crisis.
It is believed that the men of the apparatus have later become managers, the Mafioso picture has only changed its way of interfereing into the economic structures leaving the system unchanged.
Considering that in this transition period, the nomenclature of the former-communist party has continued to manage the power and it has also had available the existing financial capital, it is obvious that the new economy will have as its main managers the executives and the officers of the former communist Party who, renouncing an ideology used as a cover for unlawful activities, will have guaranteed all the necessary conditions for their future prosperity.
In a political context with such characters, professional crime has rapidly become widespread, more and more aggressive and cruel and ever ready to run bigger risks to optimise the profits.
Sources at the Russian Home Office have said that in many cities criminal structures represent serious alternatives to State bodies and that their future and possible consolidation will constitute a threat for the democratic order.
b. General structure
The over 6,000 criminal cells presently operating in the Russian Federation can rely on about 115,000 associates, and three million supporters.
It is possible to ascertain three levels of aggregation.
On the first level we find groups composed of 10-15 elements: criminal gangs operating in the micro-criminal sector.
More than 700 organisations operate on the second level, and each one counts hundreds of members.
The last level has about 150 criminal cells able to condition national economy by using lawful channels to carry out unlawful activities producing profits which allow them to eliminate competition and to master the national economic system.
In the Federation, there isn't one true "cupola mafiosa": the various criminal cells have direct influence on their own territory; the local criminal groups have areas of influence and sectors for their activities which range from racketeering to the trafficking of radioactive material.
In the elementary structure of a criminal group we find a boss, at the top, who controls four criminal sectors through a lieutenant having intermediary functions; the lieutenant's activity is controlled by two men trusted by the boss, so as to ensure his loyalty. Normally, the main criminal activities consist in drug trafficking, living off immoral earnings, corruption, and murders.
c. The different criminal typologies
According to an accredited theory, in the last twenty years the Russian criminal world has developed six criminal categories hierarchically organised, which still exist today, even if more fluidly distincted.
On the lower level we find the "non professionals", in particular the "pacany", the youths. Underaged crime is in constant increase and has its own laws, structures and leaders even though there is a widespread attempt to imitate "adult" crime. The vast majority of crimes committed by these youngsters is against property.
During the first ten months of 1994, 177,300 crimes were committed by teenagers, or with their help, with an increase of 1.5% with respect to the same period in the preceding year.
Another important datum which should cause social alarm is the increase in the number of women involved in crimes: during the first ten months of the year 1994, number of women involved in crime was 153,115, that is 13.1% of the total, with an increase of 34.3% with respect to the same period of the preceding year.
On the next level, with the job of carrying out low unskilled activities we find the "sesterki". The etymology of the name "number six" indicates the curved attitude of submission that they must have before higher hierarchy. They are entrusted with the material commission of crimes.
On a higher level we find the "kataly". Traditionally involved in gambling, since mid-seventies they developed ties with the world of black market thanks to collusions with bureaucrats, members of the police or of the judiciary. They enjoy a wide scope of action covering all the Community of Independent States, with the exclusion of those where a strong local organisation has developed.
Economic crimes are a prerogative of the "del'cy". This group is very homogeneous, and it's based on corruption: most of them carry out legal activities administering factories, companies or businesses.

The fifth category is that of the "autoritety", which numbers about 20,000 carrying out an extremely important role: surrounded by loyal men they deal with frauds and extortions.
At the highest level, we find the "vory v zakone" that is "thieves in the law". Now known as the great godfathers of Russian organised crime, they have, almost totally, abandoned symbols and rites to become true protagonists of the change occurring in the former Soviet Union.
d. Areas of influence, groups, control of the territory, and division of criminal activities
With regards to the geographic distribution of criminal groups, the Russian Home Office in 1993 signalled that over 50% were located in the cities and in the regions of Moscow and St. Petersburg.To the 10,000 professional criminals we must add others belonging to the police forces that, in exchange for their "work" receive a salary of $500 (the state salary is $70).
It has been calculated that the Mafia employs 9% of the active population and demands that banks and shops pay a percentage of 50% of the whole business volume: eight out of ten shops pay.
Moscow, with its 150 new private banks and with its 120 casinos, opened within a couple of weeks, is the obvious example of this "new course". Extortions and trafficking in drugs, arms, works of art and stolen cars is a sector run by the Chechenians; the Azeris impose payments on the food market; the Georgians are specialised in banking frauds.
From a territorial point of view, while the north of the city is controlled by the clan of the Daghestasns active in the drug sector, the south is divided between the Ljuberc family, specialised in extortions, and the Sol'ncev, specialised in robberies.
When these borders are violated, we can see bloody feuds with "excellent" homicides. According to "Isvestia" in June 1994 there had been a summit among Russian godfathers to decide the sharing among criminal groups of the territorial levels and of the sectors of activity.
Any attempt to uncover these plots leads to the physical elimination of anyone interested in them. Dimitrij Kholodov, a journalist investigating in arms trafficking, and alleged collusion of top military men, was killed with a brief-case-bomb.
Another episode is worth mentioning: in Moscow, the "Mafia of the apartments" has convinced thousands of elderly to buy the homes they had lived in as tenants for years placed on the market by the State, by financing the purchase on the agreement that they were to inherit from the tenants on their death. Few days later over three thousand of these elderly buyers were found dead.
It is also possible that criminal groups, through the mass media, are trying to manipulate public opinion in an attempt to undermine the basic structures of society. In the second half of 1994, mass media began to say that criminal activities were indispensable for the development of national economy. Based on this theory - which could easily be repealed - the wealth accumulated by criminals re-enters the legal circuit and becomes an instrument to re-distribute income.
During the first months of this year, the Russian radio/tv system was hit by many tragic events.
In March within a few days Vladislav Listeyev director of the Ostnkino (public television), and Igor Kaverin, a technician of the independent radio "Free Kakhoda" were killed. Probably Listyev was killed because he was fighting against the racket which controlled tv commercials from which organised crime draws profits of about seven million dollars a month. The killing of Listyev caused the public tv chairman Alexander Yakovev to resign as he was "tired of serving the demagogues".

4. Main illegal activities
There is a preliminary consideration to be made before analysing criminal typologies and their modus operandi: crime in the Western world involves a more or less extensive part of the population, still the majority live honestly. In the regions of the Community of Independent States, instead, there is no way of avoiding contact with the underworld as it involves an enormous number of individuals.
According to Petr Filippov, director of the Centre for political, social and economic analysis, "organised crime does not meet any resistance and an entire generation is coming of age considering it a normal condition".
Recently, last March, the presidential Security Council had to admit that "Organised crime goes unpunished : a situation which generates distrust in society and threatens national security".
The analysis of the main criminal activities shows the levels reached by the "organisations".
According to a research of 1993 by the the Russian Federation Home Office, the various crimes committed by organised criminal groups can be so classified:
- crimes concerning the economic sphere = 42% (embezzlement, counterfeiting money, corruption, bribery, violations of the provisions regulating currency operations and tampering with vodka and cognac);
- violence with the intent of profit = 48% (banditism, brigandage, extortions, and thefts);
- crimes connected with producing, trafficking, and pushing of drugs = 5%;
- other crimes = 5% (smuggling and procuring).
To controlling banks and firms, to "first level" crimes and to illegal trafficking noww must be added illegal banking operations, trafficking in radioactive and raw materials, and illegal export of currency.
Contacts with leading figures of the apparatus are privileged, and ties with international organised crime are consolidated. Part of the income is re-invested in thousands of legal businesses directly controlled by the "Mafia".
a. Drug trafficking
The former Soviet Union was the leader in the production of hashish and further there are still extensive fields of opium in Kazakhistan, in Uzbekistan, in Tajikistan, and in Kirgikistan.
To this "normal" production, we should add the activities of hundreds of laboratories run by chemistry experts in which a large quantity of synthetic drugs qualitatively better that those available on the world market are produced at very low cost.
The Russian Home Office has estimated that the internal production has a "turnover" of over 100 billion American dollars a year.
The drugs produced are mainly for internal consumption. Nevertherless, in the past many anti-drug operations conducted by Western Europe police forces have uncovered attempts to exporting drugs towards Western nations.
Russia and the southern regions are at the cross-roads of the heroin route from the Golden Triangle (Myanmar, Laos, and Thailand), and from the Golden Crescent (Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iran). The heroin is sent to Central Europe, either through the port of Tallinn (the gulf of Finland), or through the port of Odessa (Black Sea).
The ever closer collaboration between Russian criminals and Colombian cartels has opened up an alternative route for the cocaine directed to Europe. An operation concluded with the seizure of 1,092 kilos of cocaine in St. Petersburg in February of 1993 interrupted a delivery which from Columbia had arrived in the ports of Goterborg (Switzerland), and Kotka (Finland), and through Russian TIRs had reached St. Petersburg. The final destinations were the Belgian and Dutch markets. The Australian police services have also demonstrated that many sailors who work on important merchant ships are involved in drug trafficking.
b. Trafficking in arms
In spite of assurances by official bodies of the Community of Independent States, the West is very concerned for the interest shown by organised crime towards the former Soviet military arsenal, and for the possible consequences of trafficking in this strategic material.
During the first months of 1994, in St. Petersburg, an attempt to export illegally 21,000 fire arms and five million ammunitions was discovered.
Besides illegal exports, the thefts from deposits and barracks in 1994 increased by 200%.
This market is managed by what journalistic sources defined as the "military Mafia".
The arms go: partly to increase the fire power of international criminal organisations, partly to the Balkans where are sold (or exchanged for drugs) to the fighting factions. Other destinations are African nations, the Middle East, Latin-American or European (Northern Ireland) guerrilla. Much more dangerous is the smuggling of radioactive material or nuclear components.
The collapse of the Soviet Union has enabled four republics (Ukraine, Russia, Byelorussia, and Kazakhistan) to possess military and nuclear weapons. This has decreased the level of controls and protection of these strategically relevant weapons.
Between 1992 and 1994, three thefts of uranium were made public.
In this commerce, international organised crime probably plays an intermediary role, not being interested, for the moment, in possessing nuclear weapons.
c. Economic crime
The economic system of the republics of the Community of Independent States through a very serious crisis involving new and old politicians and organised crime has, in just a little time, become an instrument to acculumate extraordinary amounts of wealth damaging the entire society.
A deputy of the Duma, Serghei Skoroshkin, who had already fallen victim of an attempt on his life in May 1994 after denouncing publicly some cases of illegalities he had found out about, was seized near Moscow by fake policemen and killed with a shot in the back of the head.
In Russia alone, the privatisations planned would have allowed organised crime to control over 50,000 public and private businesses, and many of the 3,000 existing banks.
The control of the banking system enables internal criminal organisations:
- to launder unlawful profits and finance criminal groups' front businesses ;
- to manage the easy credits given by the State for the development of businesses;
- to know, through informative channels, the people to blackmail or extort money from.
Banking frauds now happen quite regularly: in 1992 a Chechenian group with false payment forms had the bank transfer into accounts especially opened 350,000 American dollars; it was again the Chechenians who, on different occasions, defrauded Siberian banks with false letters of credit, counterfeited cheques and orders of payments for companies who knew nothing about it. Another channel for easy accumulation of wealth is offered by the control of inter-bank stock exchange which determines the rouble-dollar exchange.
Illegal behaviours are frequent even in private activities: shop-owners don't invoice their goods and falsify their accounts; in the buying and selling of real estate it is constant practice to provide a figure noticeable lower than the real one (for this reason apartments in Moscow, by official statistics quite affordable are in reality very expensive).
The development of commercial relations between the republics of the former U.S.S.R. and the rest of the world has been noticeably polluted by the action of the criminal groups.
Commercial frauds have hit, above all, the exporting of raw materials of which the Soviet territory is rich.
Most crimes connected with the economic sphere have been reported in the cities of Moscow (6,344) and St. Petersburg (3,071), in the territory of Krasnodar (3,952), in the regions of Moscow (3,515) of Novosibirsk (2,819), and of Sverdlovsk (2,882) (Russian Home Office, 1994).
d. Other illegal activities
The "trade in human beings" is a business in which over 200 criminal groups, operating internally and externally to the Russian Federation, take part.
Clandestine immigration has, during the last years, changed the transit routes. The cross-roads is presently Eastern Europe. 400,000 people from Asia and the former Soviet republics leave annually and transit through Eastern Countries, heading for the West. All the "traffic" is directed by Russian citizens who, in collaboration with Western criminal organisations, take the "merchandise" over border and then send it to different nations in which these poor people will be forced to work without pay for many years.
The role of organised crime in clandestine immigration has been considered in recent years at the international level.
The Vienna conference of 23 January 1991, and the Berlin conference of 31 October 1991 were prodromic to the Plenary Meeting at Graz on 13-14 January 1992.
The following themes were discussed:
- the fight against criminal activities related to clandestine immigration;
- judiciary co-operation in criminal matters;
- the organisation of specialised units;
- the exchange of information and the co-operation for identifying false documents;
- the procedures and rules to improve controls over people;
- the fight against illegally crossing the borders.
Prostitution, both internally and abroad, is managed by groups of specialised criminals. Investigations carried out recently have shown that the controls on prostitution are very thoroughly organised. The women can use different identities; this allows them to return to "work" even after an arrest and or an order of expulsion.
Car thefts represent a significant sector of activity for Russian gangs. The police forces have discovered a car-traffic from Hungary with the cars transferred and sold in the Community of Independent States.
Furthermore, according to American sources the cars stolen in the U.S. are sold in Russia at a very high price: the example given is of a Ford with a list price of $15,000 sold for $40,000 (Secretary of the Treasury, U.S.A., 1994).

5. International interactions
The political panorama which came about from the flaking of eastern Europe has given life to a world market characterised by two migratory flows: on the one hand Western criminals leaning towards the East searching for new sources of wealth and on the other Eastern criminal groups trying to widen their range of activities.
a. Russian crime in Europe
The vast amount of money coming from the illegal activities previously considered, certainly, could not remain within the borders of the Community of Independent States; Western Europe represented a natural outlet for fruitful investments.
And this is a subject which you, esteemed gentlemen, know very well because it concerns all nations represented here. In the text which was distributed, I spoke, about some explanatory episodes which have made us Italians reflect. It is well known that in the last two years a proliferation of Russian companies, associations, and commercial structures has taken place in London which, according to Scotland Yard, are only legal fronts for illegal activities.
Bodies of killed Russian and English criminals together with reports of attempted extortions have led the investigators to believe that Russian gangs, in competition among themselves, are attempting to gain control over London's territory with the collaboration of local criminals.
The English police forces have also discovered a traffic of arms and explosives that, through sea routes, reached Northern Ireland.
According to the BKA, Russian organised crime operating in Germany is already structured into groups. Russian exiles who began operating around the end of the 70s "privilege" economic crimes, frauds, and counterfeiting. They are geographically localed in Berlin, Munich, and in the district of Rohr.
The Chechenians, who appeared for the first time in Berlin in 1991, are held responsible for
homicides and extortions.
The Georgians, responsible for thefts and counterfeiting both of money and credit cards, have been operating in Germany since the middle of the 80s.
The Ukrainians, present since 1990, have distinguished themselves in the exploitation of prostitution and illegal immigration.
Russian crime is a reality in Berlin, Cologne, Munich, and Frankfurt.
In this last city, in August 1994, four prostitutes and their protector were killed. The modalities of the execution made us think of a settling of scores for the control of the prostitution market which manages over 10,000 girls from the East, residing in Germany. Prostitution, however, is only one of the many sectors in which the Russians operate; their criminal activity touches also:
- extortions imposed on German shop-owners who wish to carry out a commercial activity in Russia;
- car thefts, managed by German godfathers who avail themselves of Polish unskilled labour;
- the traffic of strategic or nuclear material towards Iraq, Libya, and North Korea.
"Love-centres", where more than 3,000 prostitutes work, have been created in Finland. Finland is also an ideal base for drug and arms trafficking for central Europe and South America. Also the traffic of gold, spirits, and thefts of boats are of interest.
Switzerland has become one of the two European "strong-boxes" for Russian crime's illegal proceeds, even if since 1989, money laundering has become a crime.
The other "strong-box" is Austria with its severe norms on banking secrecy which, after rulings by the European Parliament, will remain unchanged until December 1996.
In France, especially on the Côte d'Azur, a noticeable increase of real-estate investments has been noted. Probably, this represents the final stage in the money laundering circuit.
The island of Cyprus has been for years a vital basis for Russian gangs' criminal activities. The bank deposits that in 1992 were estimated as $12.5 billion, in 1994 had reached $25 billion. The island counts almost 4,000 businesses, co-operatives, companies, or import-export firms managed by Russian businessmen; contextually, the criminal activity of the Russian gangs extended to hit all the legal businesses ("Confcommercio", the Italian Association of Merchants and Shopkeepers, 1994).
In Israel, the Russian Mafia uses Israelis who, for the "law of returns", have the right to return to their homeland and open an account in foreign currency without any controls. It is foreseeable that among the 500,000 Olim-Ukranians, Russians and Uzbekis who have re-entered Israel in recent years, many have been used as "dummies" for laundering illegal proceeds.
Looking at Italy more closely, we are interested in the traffic of arms and radioactive material. Many investigations have established a close connection between Russian gangs and Italian organised crime.
In Romagna, above all, the presence of synthetic drugs coming from Eastern laboratories has been noticed. Russian traffickers and dealers have been singled out in Milan, Rome, and in Versilia. In this last place, the existence of a Russian organisation, involved in laundering U.S. government bonds ready to be placed on the Russian market, and in other illegal activities under the cover of an import-export company has been ascertained. The investigations, developed during the whole of 1994, were concluded with the "operation Vodka" which ended with ten people remanded in custody by order of the examining judge at the Lucca Court.
On March 8th, 1995, Monya Elson, boss of the Russian Mafia, and rival of Boris Nayfeld was arrested in Fano in the Marche region. The godfather who ran a restaurant in New York, was the owner of an import-export company based in Fano linked to other 50 businesses in the Marche. Said business was probably only a front cover for illegal traffics.
b. Russian crime in the U.S.A
Russian crime in the USA deserves a brief side note.
According to what was declared in April of 1994 by Luis Freeh director of the F.B.I. "we are witnessing the emergence of Russian organised crime with the birth of incredibly strong criminal groups. And this is a big problem".
Police investigations and journalistic inquires have identified in the U.S. some areas in which Russian criminal groups operate: Los Angeles, San Francisco (California); Miami (Florida); Chicago (Illinois); Baltimore (Maryland); Detroit (Michigan); Lincoln (Nebraska); New York (New York); Cleveland (Ohio); Philadelphia (Pennsylvania); Seattle (Washington).
The situation appears so worrisome that the F.B.I. has created a specialised unit so as to avoid that these groups, which are already active, can "root" in the territory.
In effect, in recent years, many organisations have been identified, among them:
- Odessa, considered the most important Russian criminal group in the U.S.A.. It came to light at Brighton Beach between 1975 and 1981, and developed in the suburbs of San Francisco and Los Angeles. According to the California Department of Justice in the area of San Francisco Odessa counts about 60 members strictly organised;
- the Evangelical Mafia, which was identified in 1993 in Northern California, in Oregon, and in Washington, differs from other Russian groups as it doesn't seem to have ties with the mother country and operates, above all, in the area of Sacramento. Its members, mostly youths from 16 to 24 years of age, are specialised in car thefts and counterfeit of car-plates and serial numbers;
- the Armenians who operate in New York, Hollywood, and in California are interested in the smuggling of gasoline, and lately, also drug trafficking;
- the Chechenians, the most violent, are specialised in homicides and extortions;
- Organizatsiya is a multi-ethnic group: its members maintain relations, at an international level, with other criminal groups. They operate within commercial frauds, financial frauds, robberies, homicides, extortions, and drugs.
The features common toall these groups are the following:
- the organisations built on an ethnic basis are composed of a number of members which varies from 5 to 20;
- most members have a high cultural level and speak different languages;
- the associates avoid having contacts with the bureaucratic structures for fear of being identified;
- the groups are marked by a ferocious violence that, however, is used as "extrema ratio";
- they disdain established Authority and, often, confide in police corruption.
Among criminal activities, frauds against the nation and against private businesses represent the prevailing typologies.
However, the police force counter-action is fruitful.

6. The role of Italian organised crime in Eastern Europe
The Eastern European market with no rules, with an immense and at the same time illegal production of capital and with criminal structures ready to defend the illegal interests could not avoid attracting the attention of the Italian criminal cells, always on the look for new profits.
However, the considerations expressed in September 1994 by Krilov, Russian Foreign Office vice-Minister are not held to be wholly sound. According to him, it is ascertained that in Russia there are six different Italian criminal groups "in a secondary position and with no apparent links with Russian criminal cells in drug trafficking and in money laundering".
The Sicilian Mafia has been in close contact with the gangs of the former U.S.S.R. for a long time, it buys conventional and nuclear weapons to be routed to Middle Eastern and African Countries. The role of intermediary is not the only task Mafia families fulfil since part of the arms in transit are kept in deposits to be used in future actions. In January 1994, in a town in the province of Catania (Sicily), 26 rockets and 8 missile war-heads were found.
According to Czech police sources, in Prague, in October 1992, with a secret agreement between the Mafia and some criminal gangs of the former U.S.S.R. a killing squad had allegedly been set up, with killers coming from the ranks of the former KGB tasked with protecting the world drug-trafficking.
In February 1993, in the province of Como, the Carabinieri arrested Giulio Antonio Lombardo, suspected of being involved in the traffic of nuclear material.
The arms and drug market aren't the only illegal businesses carried out by the Sicilian-Russian criminal "association".
According to the Czech Republic Home Office, the bosses of the Italian and Russian Mafias have stipulated a joint venture aimed at controlling two thirds of the world's illegal proceeds for the year 1997.
Already in 1989 the depreciation of the rouble allowed the Mafia families of Cuntrera, Madonia, and Nitto Santapaola to speculate and therefore acquire the equivalent of $30 million rapidly invested in buying a bank in Ekaterimburg, a first step for an activity of laundering and of re-investment of illegal profits.
Furthermore, the Santapaola of Catania, and the Madonia of Palermo act as holding companies for Russian crime.
The Camorra has operated in the East with the usual system of inserting some of its men in the social tissue to be "conquered". The men of the Camorra have settled in the most profitable Russian zones, investing the resources at their disposal in criminal sectors such as racketeering and traffic of arms, and in legitimate sectors, above all, commercial activities and financial services.
The ties with the Russian and Eastern underworld have been confirmed.
In Scafati, in July 1993, four tactical weapons (bazookas) were discovered inside two cars belonging to Camorra members.
A sector in which the Camorra operates with great ability, is the counterfeiting of dollars. The $100 bills are forged in the measure of $100 billion a year. This mass of dollars is used to buy goods or to corrupt public officials, nevertheless, the most dangerous aspect is the potential for destabilisation of Eastern Countries' economies: in Russia the circulating false dollars represent a quarter of the real dollars, almost two and a half are false (Confcommercio, 1994).
The Camorra (the Licciardi clan) also takes care of the financial interests of the Russian groups, especially of the Chechenians, in the West.
The 'Ndrangheta, according to the Public Prosecutor's Office at Locri, can rely on money support in St. Petersburg. Many billions of roubles have been invested in Russia in businesses more or less legitimate.
The collaboration between Calabria organised crime and that of the East touches upon many sectors:
- in February of 1993, in Milan, Sergio Lepore was stopped. He was transporting to Calabria Russian weapons which had passed through Croatia and seven kilos of substance for cutting cocaine;
- in October of the same year, missile-launchers, various explosives, and portable Soviet made weapons were seized from people tied to Calabrian criminal cells.
Concerning money laundering, the same Public Prosecutor's Office had discovered that a man tied to the criminal cell of the Malò-Piromalli, Salvatore Filippone, laundered millions of dollars through "dummies" or financial institutes.
Several signs of Calabrian criminal participation are present also in Rumanian societies. The arrest of Domenico Libri (September 1992) led to the discovery of the plan some Calabrians had in collaboration with the Rumanian criminal organisations to insert a large amount of dollars in the process of privatisation in consideration of the absence of laws to ascertain the origin of the invested capital.
Privileged relations with Eastern criminal groups are also kept by members of the Sacra Corona Unita. The clans from Apulia benefited from the civil war in Yugoslavia and played a fundamental role in drug-trafficking and in arms-trafficking.
A large amount of the drugs produced in the Middle East, especially the Turkish one, passes through the Apulian ports.
Arms trafficking exploits the classic routes used by the suppliers of foreign tobacco, thus weapons and explosives coming from Turkey and from the former Yugoslavia transit along those routes.
The leap forward by Apulian organised crime is confirmed by:
- the ever increasing presence of citizens from Apulia and the city of Brindisi in Albanian cities, with the opening of several economic activities;
- the arrests in the Italian region of members of criminal groups working in the drug and arms trafficking.
The "Brenta Mafia" operating in the North-East of Italy has used thanks the Austrian banking guaranteeing legislation for its investments to transit towards Hungary where secret (ciphered) accounts are still available. Polish and Hungarian casinos (13 only in Budapest) are the most used means for laundering capital.
Further, investigations concluded in September 1994 led to the uncovering of a traffic of stolen cars run by Italian criminals with the participation of Rumanian, Bulgarian, Hungarian, Czech, and Slovakian criminal associations.
In 1994 the Pesaro traffic Police reported to the Public Prosecutor's Office at the Fano Court 30 people for conspiracy aimed at trafficking with stolen cars with the Czech Republic, while the Traffic Police of L'Aquila signalled out 42 individuals to the Public Prosecutor's Office of the Avezzano Court for the same traffic with Rumania.
The Teramo Police Headquarters reported, in 1994, to the Public Prosecutor's Office at the Teramo Court 24 individuals for the same crime.
It is known, in order to contrast these forms of illegal collaboration among criminals, Italy has stipulated different bilateral accords with some Eastern European Countries. Among others we can remember:
- the agreements with the U.S.S.R. and Bulgaria, respectively of the 30th November 1989 (Rome) and of the 8th December 1989 (Sofia) on drug-trafficking;
- the Budapest agreement of 19 February 1991 with Hungary on organised crime;
- the Tirana agreement of 29 August 1992 with Albania on drug-trafficking, with an added protocol regarding bilateral co-operation for the exchange of information, for the prevention and the contrast of the illegal immigration and smuggling of foreign cigarettes;
- the Rome agreement of 28 May 1993 with Byelorussia, Croatia, Rumania, Slovenia, and Ukraine on drug-trafficking;
- the Moscow agreement of 11 September 1993 with Russia, for the fight against crime which provides for regular meetings of a mixed committee; the formation of work-groups on criminal activities (money-laundering, drug-trafficking, smuggling of works of art), and on the collaborators of justice (supergrasses).
The technical agreement TELEDRUG stipulated with Russia on 13 January 1993 is of special significance. Its purpose is the creation of an information technology system for the exchange of information on drug-trafficking on the "Balkan route".

7. The fight against organised crime in the Russian Federation
The operative and legislative initiatives to contrast crime by the Republics of the Community of Independent States is in part frustrated by the fact that many Governments are unable to allocate adequate resources to the repressive apparatus, nor to create preventive socio-economic structures to stop organised crime from continuing to recruit from the impoverished populations. This has evidently delayed the tuning up of a general programme suitable to neutralise organised crime.
The absence of co-ordination in the fight against the Mafia emerges from the situation of the Russian Federation. In 1988, Gorbaciov established the Department for the Control of Organised Crime that never worked because legislation able to stop illegal activities did not exist.
The laws put into force later did not refer to a single context and neither was such objective reached by the new criminal code issued in 1990.
We need to wait until the Presidential Decree for the "Defence of the citizens and the protection of order and rights" of October 1992 to have a concrete commitment against organised crime.
New departments have been instituted within the Home Office and others have been strengthened.
Links between central and local structures have been strengthened while the Ministry of Security (the former KGB) has offered its structure to fight organised crime.
In 1993, the Department of Fiscal Police was instituted, and many bills were presented in Parliament.
However, some laws were approved with amendments that modified their ratio (the law on tax crimes and the law on public employment), others have been repealed ( the law on money laundering and on organised crime).
In June 1994, Eltsin, with a presidential decree, gave the police powers to proceed in premise searches, seizures and requests of banking information on anyone suspected of Mafia crimes without warrant by the judiciary.
The decree, which extends these measures even to the suspects' families, allows police custody for to 30 days.
Furthermore, the creation of voluntary militias of citizens with the task of helping the police in cases when someone is caught in the act of committing a crime, has been studied.
The decree has been widely criticised. Some fear that, because of the corruption among police forces, this decree can be exploited to eliminate competing criminal groups.
The fundamental problem is that, while waiting for a complete revision of the legislation against organised crime, the control and repression measures are based solely on the principle of the crime committed. On the contrary, there is need to overcome said difficulty with the issuing of provisions similar to articles 416 and 416b of the Italian criminal code which would allow to contrast the criminal associations independently from the kind of crime committed.
Nevertheless, the attempt to introduce a legislation borrowed from the Italian and American experiences was frustrated by the opposition in the Russian Parliament in December 1994.
Notwithstanding the shortcomings, however, the police contrast activities have been significant.
During the first ten months of 1994, the perpetrators of 1,188,400 crimes were identified.
62.000 drug related crimes were repressed with the seizure of 3,747 kilograms of drugs.
The price paid is very high: 162 agents died and 388 were wounded while performing their duty.
In March 1995, Eltsin created by decree the "Federal Security Service" a super agency with wide powers to contrast organised crime.
The realisation that the fight against organised crime must be developed at an international level has led the heads of the Russian police forces to support a programme common to all Countries touched by these illegal activities.
In March 1993, in Warsaw, during an international conference on crime the Russian representative, after outlining a worrying picture on the developments of the criminal situation, expressed his concerne for the insufficient level of co-operation among countries.
The answer of the West was immediate: on 20 July 1994, in Wiesbaden, representatives from the anti-crime forces of U.S.A., Germany, Canada, Russia, and Italy met with the aim of launching a common action that, among other things, should preprare the creation of a common international force, a continuous exchange of information and crypto-communications, and an exchange of specialised personnel.
The F.B.I. announced also the signing of a Russian-American agreement establishing the opening of an F.B.I. basis in Moscow, vice versa in Washington one will be opened by the Department for the fight against crime. We must underline that attempts to adopt suitable measures against organised crime have been tried by Ukraine, Byelorusia and the Republics of Central Asia.

8. Conclusions
To cnclude we can state that Russian organised crime will probably acquire more of an international character allowing it to diversify its activities in running legal businesses and to combat police forces contrasting activities.
In order for us to respond to this perspective we need to set two objectives:
- the neutralisation of the activities of the most powerful groups which operate at an international level and in close connection with the "Mafias" of other countries;
- to prevent criminal groups of whatever nationality or origin from asserting themselves in Russian society through the laundering of illegal capitals.
The essential element is co-operation among all those Nations that, at a national level, have already been fighting organised crime with a continuous exchange of information.
Convinced that all organised crime is an international problem, all nations should harmonise their legislations in the field to adjust to a world-wide and over-national challenge.
In other words, it's necessary to give a single answer to a single challenge.
The activity of police forces alone can not win. There is need to promote a new culture of legality, give hope and dignity to the Russian population that sees its own future mortgaged by illegal affairs.
The fight against organised crime cannot, therefore, be distinguished from the creation of new rules, of new principles on which to base a new society where the citizens and above all new generations can trust the State.
Through the "globalisation" of legislative systems and of objectives the fight against organised crime, now present in may nations, can be "globalised" with principles and values valid in all social contexts.