Organised crime is top threat to European security: Europol

Increasingly violent organised crime groups pose the biggest threat to European security, outstripping terrorism and migration, top police from across the continent said Tuesday.

Italian mafia groups, Albanians and Eastern Europeans, and "outlaw" motorcycle gangs were the biggest players, officials told a conference led by Italy's anti-mafia agency and the EU police agency Europol.

But Asian, African and South American groups were also muscling in on Europe's €110-billion a year organised crime business, with many increasingly working with each other, the meeting in The Hague heard.

"Currently organised crime constitutes the highest risk for EU internal security, Jari Liukku, head of Europol's European Serious and Organised Crime Centre, told a press conference.

Officials said that organised crime had been "in the shadow" in recent years when Europe faced a wave of terrorist attacks and a huge migration crisis, but that it now had to be tackled by cross-border cooperation.

"To prevent organised crime we have to act internationally, because the organised crime groups are already doing it," added Liukku.

Giuseppe Governale, head of Italy's Anti-Mafia Investigation Directorate,...