Italian Police Arrest Calabrian Mafia Boss

Rome, Italy (AHN) - Italy's renewed battle against crime is working. Three days after hundreds of police officers were sent to subways, railway stations and an immigrant center, Italian police snared a Mafia boss.

Paolo Nirta, a wanted Calabrian Mafia leader, is the brother-in-law of a major suspect in the August 2007 death of six Italians in Duisburg.

Nirta was apprehended at a narrow alley in San Luca, after a brief foot chase. The town is considered the lair of the Ndrangheta, the Calabrian version of the Mafia.

He is the suspected acting leader of the Nirta family, locked in a rivalry war with the Pelle-Vottari clan since the 1990s. Nirta's brother-in-law, Giovanni Strangio, is one of the suspects in the Duisburg murders.

The police officers were deployed in Rome and Milan. At least 3,000 Italian policemen and soldiers will be sent to two key Italian cities and other areas for six months in an effort by newly installed Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi to curb criminality and illegal immigration.