Piantedosi meets Dutch Minister van Weel: EU cooperation on organised crime and migration at the centre

The Minister of the Interior Matteo Piantedosi met on the morning of December 3rd at Interior Ministry the Dutch Minister of Justice and Security David van Weel.

“We are living in a very important moment – ​​he declared Crying himself – for the future of the European Union and for the definition of its new agenda, in this perspective I am sure that together we will be able to bring the common priorities to the European bodies starting from the next Justice and Home Affairs Council scheduled in Brussels on 12 and 13 December”.

At the centre of the fruitful conversation was the fight against transnational organised crime and human trafficking, fight against drug trafficking and new synthetic drugs such as Fentanyl, fight against terrorism and extremism.

“With regard to the issue of irregular migration – continues the Minister Piantedosi – according to studies conducted by Europol, over 90% of illegal migrants arriving in Europe have used traffickers for all or part of their journey. Therefore, one of the ways to weaken the trafficking cartels is to promote targeted asset-related investigations into the illicit profits made by these organizations, whose activities, according to the United Nations, generate between 5 and 6 billion euros each year only with reference to the main routes from Africa to Europe, and from South to North America.

Our investigative and intelligence bodies have ascertained that, for the Mediterranean routes, the overall cost of the journey paid by the migrant can vary between 2000 and 12.000 euros depending on the country of origin and the conditions of the vessels used to cross the sea". "The meeting - concluded the owner of the Interior Ministry – testifies to a strong revival of Italian-Dutch relations and a strengthening of forms of cooperation in various sectors between our Police Forces”.