From: Phantis
Balkan Mafias broaden their reach through Greece
by Ioannis Michaletos
Greek and Balkan organized criminal structures tend to merge as of lately creating an even larger menace for local societies and a serious security concern for the authorities
Greek organized crime networks and Balkan ones, most especially from Albania, have for several years competed amongst each other for illicit revenues and for staking a claim in urban “turfs” that were viewed as locales for raising substantial amounts of revenue from sectors such as narcotics, prostitution and racketeering.
The financial depression in the country along with decades-old buildup of common interests has matured in merges to a great extent creating hybrid networks that have a greater reach not only nationally but regionally. In addition the criminal groups based in Athens especially, tend to supply terrorist groups with weaponry, while being able to “cut deals” for a variety of criminal actors from afar as Georgia, Ukraine, Lebanon, Gulf states, Czech republic and Latin America.
Arms trafficking in and off the country are becoming a menace for Greek security authorities, since it is directly related to the social threat posed by criminal groups and to the supply of terrorist groups. Over the past 5 years Greek Police has increased more than 500% the number of hand grenades been confiscated compared to a previous period. AK-47, Tokarev, Makarov and Zastava semi-automatic pistols, as well as, RPG’s and plastic explosives are routinely found in the hands of criminal groups that are often of mixed Greek-Balkan composition.
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Points of interest
– More than 200 Greek citizens of young age have been arrested as “drug mules” mostly in international airports across the planet in the last 18 months. Almost all were recruited by local Greek-Balkan criminals and lured with the motive of fast cash with minimum effort. The rapidness and easiness the recruitment took place was astonishing. In most cases the youth was approached by nigh-life patrons in a specific operation to replenish the “drug mule population” with clean record citizens from a country that rarely produced such kind of trafficking services.
– Sex tourism: Greece and especially Athens are becoming steadily a tourist hot spot for sex tourism. More than 600 illegal sex premises operate in metropolitan Athens region with a daily cash flow estimated at more than 1 million Euros, excluding other levels of the illicit sex industry.
– Tobacco contraband in the county is estimated at 1 billion Euros annually and has resulted in the empowerment of the links between Greeks mafias and those of Albania, Ukraine, Serbia and Bulgaria ones. It is directly related to drug contraband using established infrastructure and human resources
