Somali-Italian cooperation

1,400 billion for the Somali-Italian cooperation in the decade from 1981 to 1990, he
notes that more than 80% was allocated to projects 'physical'
while the remaining part in "non-physical investments."
In particular, 49% went to the construction of major infrastructure (works by
regime), 21% of productive investments concentrated (industries
farms and super modern) high capital intensity, and only about 15%
investments in "social community" that is, investment in infrastructure that could
be considered for the benefit of the population.
The "non-physical investments" - in the field of training, technical assistance,
programs of "institution building", ie capacity building of
decision, management and maintenance - are 13% of the total, and are made
particularly by cooperation with the University of Somalia.

Garoé ROAD AND PORT-Bosaso Bosaso.
These two works, which have
resulted in a total cost of $ 300 billion, are among the most controversial
that which relates to the utility, the road crosses a desert region and underpopulated and would serve for the transport of troops Siad Barre. The average cost
per kilometer was EUR 605 million, so not only disproportionate compared
inedie the Italian, but also in relation to the costs of other roads made by
Como cooperation in Africa, the maintenance of the road is also made
difficult not only by the lack of ad hoc processes of training of personnel
Somali, but also by the fact that the road, running in flat territory, is
continuously affected by the irregularity of the scheme rain.
Between 1992 and the end of 1993, Italy has experienced a very stirred at
Following the judicial investigations into chronicle known by the term "Hands
clean. "
In fact the Milan prosecutors had failed to bring forth one of the
main lines of the system of corruption that involved at various levels
public administrators and entrepreneurs.
In this framework, some investigations made it possible to introduce a reality in
which the massive appropriations for Cooperation with Developing Countries
were a not insignificant part of the whole system tangentizio Italian.
The aim was also interested in the Prosecutor's Office of Rome to which the prosecutors in Milan
transmitted part of the proceedings, which eventually led to instruct processes at both
Milan and in Rome.
The investigations made it possible to discover projects so expensive and unnecessary
multi-billion dollar funds, theft and bribes, with the outline of trafficking of all
Typically, first of all, especially for Somalia, arms trafficking.
In particular, the process took place in Rome instructed by the PM Paraggio n. 4723/93
RGNR against Forte, Citaristi Martinez, Lodi, Scaroni on
their way to the fateful Garoe - Bosaso and contracts related to it
(Awarded to consortia Saces (Astaldi Cogefar, Edilter) and LOFEMON
(Lodi, Fortunato, Montedil).
According to the indictment, the system of corruption that accompanied the cooperation has
moved bribes of up to 35-40 per cent of turnover, by increasing the costs of the
out of control by both Italian as part of Somalia.
The investigations took place at the Milan prosecutor's office (Dr. Gemma Gualdi pm) and
the prosecutor of Rome (pm dr. Vittorio Paraggio), but the results have not been
positive trials in which defendants have seen politicians like Craxi,
Pillitteri, Citaristi, Forte, entrepreneurs like Lodi, public managers as
Martinez were all closed in acquittals and dismissals.
Even prosecutions before the Court of Auditors have seen
the acquittal of the accused.
In August 1992, Mustafa Tolba, Secretary of UNEP, the UN agency for the environment, warns of more resounding: "Italian Companies discharging toxic waste in Somalia. I can not name names because we are dealing with the Mafia, I would put at risk the lives of many people. " A statement issued in the cold. After weeks of silence, Mustafa Tolba added: "A contract between two European industries and Somalia to the annual transport of about half a million tonnes of toxic waste in this country is bankrupt. UNEP is satisfied because it prevented an environmental tragedy. "
What happened? The allegation of Tolba breaks a dense network of financial transactions and contacts that was building for some time. In May 1991, the Health Minister of Somalia, Nur Elmi Osman, and the central bank governor, Ali Abdi love him, both of the faction of Ali Mahdi, at that time in Rome, you do print the bills to be discounted in exchange for medicines send to Somalia. Some Italian companies are contacted with a request to facilitate the payment of the effects signed by Nur Elmi Osman and endorsed by the signature of the Governor of the Central Bank of Somalia. The total amount of funding requested nearly 13 billion lire. The bills are headed and declared payable to the company Finchart.
The operation eventually failed due to bureaucratic obstacles, but leaves open the disturbing questions. How is it possible to send medicines in a country torn apart by civil war, with the port of Mogadishu unusable? How Somalis would pay if the government funds are frozen in Italian banks because of the war? How can the SACE (the body of the Ministry of Foreign Trade Italian ensures that the operations of Italian companies abroad) act as guarantor of the transaction?
You can pay in another way, maybe "in kind", providing for the disposal of toxic waste and land use controlled by Ali Mahdi, who at that time in need of economic resources and military equipment to finally overthrow the fortunes of war.
In fact, a few months later, Jagiswar Singh, Indian by birth and Swiss by adoption, is in charge of finding a bank or a financial institution prepared to carry out the operation of discounting of bills of Finchart. Singh is the Swiss Achair & Partners, which says it is prepared to provide for the funding, but asks in exchange for a concession to dispose of waste in Somali territory.
You sign a contract. On 5 December 1991 the Achair & Partners is authorized to construct a multipurpose center for treatment, incineration and disposal of hospital waste and industrial-type and special-toxic. Pending the construction of the Center, says the contract, the waste will be stored in the location chosen for an annual volume of 500 thousand tons.
The game is done. I put the Somali territory and can get the weapons to fight in exchange must accept the waste. The Swiss company indicates in another Italian, Marcello Giannoni, the brains of the operation. Giannoni's Attorney's Progress Ltd., established in Livorno January 9, 1992, which at the time was as president Awais Nur Osman, Somali Minister of Foreign Trade, the same as in November 1991 gave a mandate to own Giannoni to find markets international medium and long term aimed at the realization of industrial projects to settle on Somali territory. In August and September 1992, Mustafa Tolba speaks. The business fades.
Complaints against malaffari who epicenter Somalia instead multiply. On 25 November 1992 Piero Ugolini, an official of the Italian Cooperation in Somalia in the second half of the eighties, presents a detailed account-complaint. In October 1993, Franco Oliva), who is also an expert of the Italian Cooperation, returns to Mogadishu after having been in the same period of Ugolini. There remains just twenty days, just long enough to detect some irregularities and be seriously injured in a mysterious ambush.
Several Italian prosecutors investigating the scandalous activities of cooperation. It also consists of a bicameral commission of inquiry that works between 1994 and 1996, focusing attention, with regard to Somalia, especially on the fishing fleet Shifco (six ships, a gift of the order of more than 70 billion by the fact Italian Cooperation to Somalia, and the suspicion is that the boats have served to carry weapons).
The Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry on the waste cycle recently wrote: "It has been established that there is drilling activity and sinking at sea containers, off the north-eastern coast of Somalia." Even in the South, Merca, in the summer of 1993 arena aboard a ship with seven crew members died in mysterious circumstances, perhaps victims of fumes emanating from the cargo.
In January 1996, moreover, Giancarlo Moroccan, an Italian businessman for a long time in Somalia, ahead of the parliamentary commission on cooperation had claimed to have news on the dumping of radioactive waste in the North of the country. Morocco, however, has been shown by other witnesses as the intermediary for agreements for the transport of toxic waste in Somalia from Europe.
Suspects, news, intrigues. In an attempt to shed light are working on several Italian prosecutors, including those of Reggio Calabria, Torre Annunziata, Asti.
The investigation of Reggio Calabria, in particular, part of the sinking, September 21, 1987, Rigel's boat off the coast of Cape Teulada. A tip and some wiretaps put the judges on the trail of a possible traffic of toxic and radioactive waste. The investigation widens: in December 1990 the ship Red, former Jolly Rosso already involved in the trafficking of waste, runs aground at Cape Suvero.
In '96, the investigation goes to the District Anti-Mafia Directorate of Reggio Calabria. At the Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry on waste the prosecutor Alberto Cisterna said that some people linked to the ionic gangs in the province of Reggio Calabria, partly resident in German territory, they are stakeholders to the activity of German companies which are already in the books and in the documentation acquired in the course of the investigation of the sinking ships. A foreign employee also connects the sinking of ships carrying waste to arms trafficking landed in Calabria and Aspromonte intended to gangs. Between the Ionian and the Adriatic sea would in time 32 sunken ships. Operations are in progress to search for Rigel, coordinated by ANPA, National Environment Protection Agency.
Being studied by investigators of the various prosecutors successive episodes and characters partly known and partly not.
For example, who is really Guido Garelli, an Apulian 54 years with multiple identities and trades, reported the territorial administration of the Sahara controlled by the Polisario Front, and in Somalia to bring arms sales, and even in Nairobi, Kenya, to sign (24 June 1992) an economic agreement with two other Italians, including Moroccan.
"We fight with bare hands against tanks," concludes Tarditi. "We need to introduce new types of offenses and increase penalties. Prosecute traffickers of waste is now very difficult: we can not authorize wiretaps or arrest anyone, even if caught in the act. The traffic of waste is currently an offense lapse in four and a half years. "