(ANSA) - TRIESTE, 04 APR - The transnational cooperation in the fight against mafia "exists" but "should always be improved and updated. We must never rest on our laurels and consider the stages acquired. The knowledge of the respective judicial systems and the operative capacities of each State is the secret weapon to succeed in defeating the criminal forces inside the respective countries. Moreover, knowing the legal systems of neighboring countries is a duty for a border region like Friuli Venezia Giulia." So said Trieste Chief Prosecutor, Antonio De Nicolo, at the conference "Cross-border crime. Police and judicial cooperation", promoted by the Direction of anti-mafia investigation (DIA).

De Nicolo added that the mafia "has been crossing national borders for decades." On this issue, "there is no surprise. The mafia no longer kills but invests. It works with computers with which it moves huge amounts of money, and it works disregarding the police forces and the respective state borders. Therefore, it is good that the police forces equip themselves to be competitive, both from the technological point of view and in terms of ability to move." According to the District Prosecutor of the Public Prosecutor's Office of Koper (Slovenia), Katjusa Poropat, "in Slovenia, increasingly sophisticated forms of organized crime are emerging that require increasingly advanced knowledge and high capacity of the law enforcement agencies and prosecutors' offices.

International crime is increasingly widespread. No country can fight it alone anymore" since "it acts on an international level. therefore international cooperation is essential." Between 2020 and 2021, then said the Prosecutor of Klagenfurt (Austria), Joseph Haissl, Austria recorded "a worrying increase of about 57% of criminal organizations", but the percentage of solved cases, "equal to about 81%, reassures us. Several groups - he added - have foreign origins. Electronic files can be an advantage to combat the phenomenon, even across borders." (ANSA).