'NDRANGHETA BUST NETS MILAN ENTREPRENEURS

'NDRANGHETA BUST NETS MILAN ENTREPRENEURS

(ANSA) - Milan, November 3 - Police in Milan on Tuesday arrested 17 people, some of them well-known entrepreneurs, while breaking up a protection racket run by Calabria's 'Ndrangheta mafia.

Police said the crime ring muscled business people in construction and real estate into paying protection money.

Some of the victims reportedly appealed to the crime ring for help cutting red tape and elbowing out competition.

Milan prosecutor Manilo Minale said ''this operation showed for the first time how local construction companies not only bowed down to the 'Ndrangheta, but tried to work with it to get ahead''.

''Businesses need to work with the state, not against it,'' said the prosecutor who urged the victims of mafia intimidation to come to the police.

Minale also said that there was no ''middle road'' in dealing with the mafia and that authorities would take a hard line on business people who tried to use it to their advantage.

During the bust, police seized assets and cash amounting to five million euros, in addition to guns, silencers, a pair of hand grenades and four kg of cocaine.

Investigators said the gangsters arrested belonged to the Calabrian mafia's third generation in the northern city with solid connections in local business and city administration.

Based in the southern Italian region of Calabria, the 'Ndrangheta has extended its control of drug trafficking, building rackets and waste disposal scams across the country.

It is now reckoned to be the most powerful of Italy's mafias, its ranks and influence swelled by massive drugs profits.