Serbian mafia

The Serbian mafia (Serbian: Cpпска мафиј, Srpska mafija), or Serbian organized crime, are various criminal organizations based in Serbia or composed of ethnic Serbs in the former Yugoslavia and Serbian diaspora. The organizations are primarily involved in smuggling, arms trafficking, drug trafficking, human trafficking, assassinations, heists, assault, protection rackets, murder, money laundering and illegal gambling. Ethnic Serb organized crime groups are organized horizontally; higher-ranked members are not necessarily coordinated by any leader.^[10] According to criminologists and law enforcement authorities, the Serbian mafia is the most powerful in Europe.^[11][12]

Serbian organized crime emerged during the 1970s as increasing numbers of Yugoslav expatriates emigrated to Western Europe. Serbian gangsters in Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and France carried out robberies and heists with the support of the Yugoslavian security services, which employed expatriate criminals as informants and assassins, and in exchange provided them with weapons and legal protection. Such government support, along with the wealth Serbian gangs accumulated through a pattern of robberies, allowed the Serbian mafia to become one of the most powerful crime groups in Europe by the 1980s.^[13] One of the most significant mafia groups in Scandinavia is the Serbian-Montenegrin mafia in Scandinavia, also known as Juggemaffian ("Yugo Mafia"). The foundations of the gang began during the mass immigration of Yugoslav guest-workers to Sweden in the 1970s. Its power base is in the cities of Stockholm and Copenhagen, with territory in Malmö and Gothenburg, among other cities in western Sweden. The "Yugo Mafia" received significant media attention in Sweden especially during the 1990s, thanks to flashy top-ranking members such as Dragan "Jokso" Joksović. The founder and first leader of the gang is believed to be warlord Željko Ražnatović Arkan.

Following the breakup of Yugoslavia, many Serbian gangsters throughout Europe returned to Serbia to exploit new criminal opportunities and serve in paramilitary units during the Bosnian War.^[13] The Serbian mafia gave many Serbs a perceived way out of the economic disaster that occurred in the country following the implementation of internationally imposed sanctions against Serbia during the Yugoslav Wars of the 1990s. Serbian criminals have also been recruited into state security forces, a notable example being Milorad "Legija" Ulemek, a commander in Arkan's Tigers, which was re-labelled as the JSO (Red Berets) after the war.

During the period when the cigarette mafia operated, the Serbian mafia earned about 100 billion dollars.^[14] The annual earnings of the Serbian mafia in Cocaine market are estimated at $80 billion.^{[15][16][17][18][19][20]} the Serbian mafia is composed of several major international criminal organizations specializing in the cocaine trade, which in turn have wider networks throughout Europe and across the world. These include some highly successful groups, including one of the largest cocaine import enterprises in Europe, "Group America", and the "Pink Panthers", responsible for some of the biggest heists ever committed.^[21] The Serbian mafia has established a direct connection with the majority of cocaine producers, purchasing drugs directly from South American producers, selling them only to wholesalers operating in Europe.^[22][23]

According to estimates by Europol and the United States Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), the Serbian cartel "Group America", also known "el cartel de las Balcanes" ("the cartel of the Balkans"),^[2] imports about 500 tons of cocaine annually to Europe. The boss of the group, Dejan Stanimirovic, was wanted by more than 30 countries.^[24][25] In June 2013, Forbes magazine published a list of the richest mafia bosses in the world, with Serbian drug lord Darko Šarić in fifth place with an estimated 27 billion dollars worth of assets.^{[26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33]}