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Shkruar nga Pamfleti
From luxury villas in Spain to offshore companies in tax havens, the Italian anti-mafia is rebuilding the mafia's financial empire. Among the countries where he is suspected of moving and establishing contacts during his escape is Albania.
The discovery of assets worth over 200 million euros, linked to Matteo Messina Denaro's financial network, has brought back into the spotlight not only the economic empire of the Cosa Nostra boss, but also the old investigative leads that connected him to the Balkans and Albania.
The operation carried out by the Guardia di Finanza and the Palermo Anti-Mafia Prosecutor's Office is considered one of the biggest blows to the economic legacy of the Sicilian mafia. Three people were arrested, while companies, real estate, financial accounts and other assets were seized that, according to investigators, were created from the profits of international drug trafficking since the 1980s.
The investigation extends to several countries around the world, including Andorra, Gibraltar, the Cayman Islands, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Lebanon, Monaco and Spain, where authorities uncovered a complex network of investments hidden behind offshore companies. According to Palermo prosecutor Maurizio de Lucia, it is about "a significant part of the investments that Cosa Nostra has made outside Italy over the decades."
Among the assets identified are real estate companies, luxury villas in the exclusive areas of Marbella, Malaga and Puerto Banus, as well as financial structures set up to recycle the profits of cocaine trafficking. Italian media have described the operation as the discovery of Matteo Messina Denaro's "drug treasure trove".
But while investigators are uncovering traces of mafia capital in Europe and in tax havens, one question still remains unanswered: has any part of this financial network reached Albania?
For years, Albania's name has appeared in various Italian reports related to Denaro's movements during his 30-year fugitive. According to Italian media, the Cosa Nostra boss is suspected of traveling to Albania and Montenegro to build contacts related to international drug trafficking.
Reports say that initially Luca Bellomo, the husband of his niece Lorenza, was sent to Albania, while later Denaro himself is suspected of having made trips to meet businessmen and influential people. Italian investigators have raised suspicions that these movements are related to the expansion of the cocaine trafficking network and possible investments outside Italy.
Even investigative journalist Roberto Saviano, one of the greatest experts on the Italian mafia, has mentioned Albania when talking about Denaro's hidden wealth.
" Prosecutors will probably never be able to identify all of Matteo Messina Denaro's money. Material assets in Italy can be traced, but accounts abroad, his money perhaps in Albania, an area where investigations have often tracked him, or capital in tax havens, may never be discovered ," Saviano wrote in an analysis dedicated to the mafia boss's legacy.
So far, the Italian authorities have not made public any assets seized in Albania and there is no official confirmation of Denaro's investments in Albanian territory. However, the fact that Albania has been repeatedly mentioned in the investigation leads and in the analysis of his financial network has led to questions being raised after the latest anti-mafia operation about the role that our country may have played in the movements of one of the most powerful European mafia bosses.
As Italy continues to dismantle the financial empire of the man who defied justice for three decades, part of the mystery still remains unsolved: how much of Matteo Messina Denaro's hidden wealth is still off the radar of investigators and did any of it pass through Albania? / Pamphlet
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