Italian police have arrested 32 suspected members of a criminal gang linked to a fugitive considered the top boss of the Sicilian Mafia.
Among those arrested, in raids from Sicily to northern Italy, were the director of a prison near Rome and an official from the Public Works Ministry.
Both are accused of using their positions to help steer government contracts to companies favoured by Sicilian mobsters, such as fugitive Bernardo Provenzano.
Most of the other suspects have been charged with Mafia association.
Getting their hands of public contracts for construction or for supplying such institutions as hospitals and prisons has long been a lucrative business for Cosa Nostra in Sicily and elsewhere in Italy.
The suspects are believed to be close to the clan of Giuseppe Madonia, who was a lieutenant to Provenzano and one of the Italian Mafia's top bosses before his 1992 arrest.
The ring centred on three brothers who were arrested near Milan, Antonio, Crocifisso and Salvatore Rinzivillo, news reports say. The three allegedly bribed officials to win public works contracts worth millions of dollars.
A Rome lawyer, who was among those arrested, allegedly acted as intermediary.
Investigators also froze several bank accounts to cut off mobsters' money.
Provenzano has been on the run for 38 years. He is believed to have become the Mafia's No.1 boss after a fellow long-time fugitive, Salvatore Riina, was arrested in Palermo in 1993.
PA