Italian prosecutors said on Tuesday they had dismantled a Syrian-led network accused of laundering drug-trafficking proceeds in Italy and France by converting cash into gold bars. The Guardia di Finanza police arrested five people in the northern regions of Piedmont and Lombardy and seized €17m (R345.7m), Milan prosecutors said in a statement. The investigation was conducted by a joint team including Italy's tax police and the French national gendarmerie in Marseille, coordinated by the Italian national anti-mafia directorate and the Marseille prosecutor's office, along with Eurojust and Europol. Over 10 months, the ... (full story)