€1.6bn of Italian mafia assets seized

Italian police seized assets worth more than €1.6bn from five Sicilian siblings suspected of links to the island’s Cosa Nostra mafia, in one of the biggest ever such operations.

The three Virga brothers and two sisters — described as “business people” from the area around Sicily’s main city Palermo — allegedly received help from Italy’s most storied criminal group to receive construction contracts related to public works.

RaiNews reported that the family were all occasional farm workers in the 1980s before becoming multi- millionaires. There was no immediate comment from the Virga family.