Italy+SFAR

Casey Greuber, //Writing For Intelligence 1 November 2009 //

=Illegal Immigration, Illicit Drugs, And Organized Crime Likely To Remain Primary Transnational Issues In Italy =

 It is likely Italy's primary transnational issues will continue to be illegal immigration, which stems mainly from the North African countries of Algeria, Libya, Morocco, and Tunisia, illicit drugs such as cocaine and heroin, and internal organized crime syndicates that are expanding into Italy's bordering nations. It is unlikely illegal immigration will negatively impact the ability of the Italian Health Ministry to control the spread of H1N1 because the nations from which individuals immigrate to Italy are experiencing relatively few H1N1 cases, being effected by stringent Italian immigration policies, and enacting vaccination programs. Although drug trafficking and organized crime will almost certainly not influence the H1N1 virus, they will likely remain key concerns of Italian policy-makers and law enforcement.
 * Executive Summary: **

Due to Italy's expansive coastline and accessible seaports, the country experiences a heavy influx of illegal immigrants, particularly from North African countries. ****According to correspondents in Rome, there are unofficially 600,000 illegal immigrants in Italy, 36,000 arriving in 2008 alone, and these ****immigrants incite ethnic conflicts that can result in violence, as well as unstable ****unemployment rates. Despite United Nations human right activists concern over Italy's ** **treatment of immigrants, on 2 July 2009, the Italian Senate voted 157-124 in favor of legislation that made being an illegal immigrant a crime punishable with a fine of USD 7,500 to USD 15,000 and allowed officials to detain immigrants up to six months longer. The Chamber of Deputies approved the bill. As of October, following the passage of the bill, Italian Prime Minister Silvo Berlusconi announced that illegal immigration decreased 90 percent within five months. Prime Minister Berlusconi credits the decrease in immigration to the recent bill, as well as the Italy-Libya Agreement of 5 May 2008 under the Treaty on Friendship, which encourages bilateral cooperation to lessen illegal immigration through joint-patrolling of Libya's borders and seaports.
 * Discussion: 

 The immigrants' commonly utilized route across the Mediterranean Sea to the Pelagie Islands and Sicily from North African countries is dangerous, despite the fairly simple entrance into Italy's southern border. Nevertheless, Algeria, Libya, Morocco, and Tunisia continue to be the source of the greatest amount of illegal immigrants to Italy. Once immigrants are successfully within the country, EU immigration policies, particularly those of the Schengen Convention, make it simple for these individuals to move within Western Europe. However, it is unlikely these North African immigrants will hinder the Italian government's ability to control the H1N1 virus and illegal immigration stemming from North Africa is unlikely to affect Western Europe as a whole. Aside from Morocco, the North African countries of Algeria, Libya, and Tunisia report no more than 59 H1N1 cases and only Algeria reports fatalities. Algeria and Libya purchased 32.5 million and 6 million doses respectively with the intent to immunize almost all, if not the entire population, with one dose of the vaccine. Morocco and Tunisia were not capable of procuring the H1N1 vaccine prior to flu season, but these countries expect to receive vaccine donations from more prosperous nations and drug makers such as GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi Pasteur through a distribution procedure developed by the World Health Organization. Due to the high likelihood of these North African countries enacting vaccination programs, in combination with strengthening illegal immigration policies, it is unlikely illegal immigration from North Africa will hinder Italy's Health Ministry from controlling the H1N1 virus within its borders, but it will almost certainly remain a key transnational issue. ** Italy's geographic location makes the country a gateway for illicit drugs entering the European Union (EU), specifically stimulants and opiates like cocaine from Latin American and heroin from southwest Asia. According to the New York Times, heroin-related deaths in Italy continue to alarm government officials. In 1989 Italian police referred to Milan as the "European heroin capital" and ranked Italy as having the largest number of drug-related deaths in Western Europe. //The New York Times// reports that heroin in Italy primarily arrives from the Middle Eastern nations of Syria and Turkey, and south Asia, particularly Bangladesh and India. According to the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, Italy has the second highest lifetime prevalence of cocaine among young adults in the EU and an estimated three to four of every 1,000 adults in Italy abuse cocaine.
 * 

Illicit drugs and organized crime are clearly a closely-related transnational issue in Italy and, since the 1980s, Italian and Eastern European crime syndicates, particularly Bulgarian and Albanian, developed the heroin market in cities before aspiring to enter the cocaine market. Although Italian organized crime derives revenue from other networks of operations than illicit drugs, such as arms trafficking, protection rackets, and even real estate, drug trafficking creates the most revenue for the country's internal organized crime syndicates at an estimated USD 88 billion in 2009 alone. Despite the negative statistics, Italy's increased law enforcement efforts in 2009 effectively limit the drug trafficking network developed by crime syndicates and, in June, Italian authorities arrested 50 individuals from the south Calabria region's drug trafficking ring known as the 'Ndrangheta Mafia, the crime syndicate dominating the cocaine and heroin trade all throughout Europe. The Italian National Police also succeeded in apprehending members of prominent Albanian, as well as Bulgarian, drug trafficking rings in 2009. Italian organized crime is of particular concern in Western Europe due to evidence of Italy's crime syndicates like the 'Ndrangheta, Cosa Nostra, and Camorra Mafias operating in bordering nations, particularly Germany and Belgium, and creating rivalry mob violence. **

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Analytic confidence for this assessment is //medium//. Source reliability ranges from medium to very high, but there was minor conflict among sources relating to the specific number of H1N1 cases reported in various countries Italy experiences an influx of illegal immigration from. The analyst utilized the number of H1N1 cases corroborated by the largest number of reliable sources. The analyst had low expertise, worked in a team with three other Western Europe analysts, and did not use structured analytic methods. The subject was minimally complex and there was adequate time for collection and analysis.
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Analytic Confidence:

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">For questions or comments, please contact the author: <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Casey Greuber

Return To: Home | Short Form Analytic Reports **