Dawn raid on Corleone sheep farm ends 43-year hunt (supersedes previous) .
by Denis Greenan .
(ANSA) - Palermo, April 11 - Cosa Nostra superboss Bernardo Provenzano, whose ghostly aura fed the Sicilian Mafia's mystique for almost half a century, was arrested Tuesday morning in the biggest police coup in over a decade .
Provenzano, 73, did not resist arrest when police broke into his hide-out in an apparently abandoned building on a sheep farm near his home town of Corleone south of Palermo .
"He didn't move. He was unruffled and didn't say anything," the arresting officer said. Police called the arrest "historic" .
Provenzano's capture was also hailed by politicians including Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu, who said "Cosa Nostra has lost its undisputed head", and President Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, who phoned national anti-Mafia chief Piero Grasso to congratulate him .
"If he's a ghost, then we're ghostbusters," a jubilant Grasso quipped .
He said the boss's demise proved the Italian State could win the fight against the Mafia and those that protect it - adding that Provenzano's ability to elude capture had been boosted by local businessmen and politicians. "Grasso, Grasso," cheered a packed crowd outside Palermo courthouse when the boss was bundled into the building on Tuesday afternoon to be formally identified .
Policemen and women joined the celebrations - seasoned flying squad officers openly wept with joy - while many in the crowd shouted insults at the toppled kingpin. Police finally cornered the boss - who had slipped through the police's fingers on several occasions, helped by well-placed 'moles' - by using wiretaps to follow packages of messages and laundry .
They then planted bugs in the farm building and moved in when they were sure who the 'old farmer' staying there really was. Provenzano, a peasant who rose up the Mafia's ranks through his ability as a killer, was found with a bundle of messages in his jeans .
Shunning phones, he had used these scraps of paper for years to give orders and send out for food and other necessities, shielded by lieutenants and relatives .
According to his 'postman', picked up on a recent wiretap, Provenzano had complained that underlings were throwing away food with worms in it - saying it was a shame to waste it .
The building where Provenzano was found, next to a sheep pen, appeared out of use but police discovered three sparsely furnished rooms inside it, containing a small stove, a simple bed and a typewriter. Provenzano, nicknamed Binnu (The Tractor) for his steamroller character, had been a fugitive for over 43 years and became the undisputed 'boss of bosses' of the Sicilian Mafia after the January 1993 arrest of Salvatore (Toto') Riina, his former rival as the mob's top hitman. Provenzano reined in the offensive unleashed by Riina - which included the murder of Italy's top two anti-Mafia judges and bombings in Rome and Milan - and took the organisation back underground to forge new political ties, claim public contracts and run rackets in relative peace, police say .
He has left a stable power structure run by two lieutenants, Salvatore Lo Piccolo, 63, and Matteo Messina Denaro, 43 - one of whom will take up the reins without a bloody war of succession, police say .
Lo Piccolo, on the run for 23 years, was Provenzano's right-hand man in the Palermo rackets and his experience may help him get the nod over the younger man .
But Denaro, a former Porsche-driving playboy from Trapani who appears in his last photo like a trim, fashionably coiffed manager on the make, enjoys an almost mythical status among younger mafiosi .
He sealed an equal reputation for brutality by murdering a rival Trapani boss and, on a whim, strangling his three-months pregnant girlfriend. Up until recently Provenzano's whereabouts and his physical appearance were shrouded in mystery .
Investigators got a break two years ago when they learned that he had travelled to a Marseilles clinic twice in 2003 for prostate surgery under an assumed name .
They arrested the Sicilian politician who obtained identity papers for the fugitive and he later turned state's witness .
Information offered by doctors and nurses at the clinic allowed computer experts to construct a more accurate identikit of the fugitive .
Until then all police had to go on was a photograph taken over 40 years ago for Provenzano's identity card, before he went underground .
Der italienischen Polizei gelang es am Dienstagmorgen, einen der wohl berüchtigsten Bosse der sizilianischen Mafia Cosa Nostra nach über 43-jähriger Flucht zu verhaften, wie die Nachrichtenagentur ANSA gestern berichtete.

Bernardo Provenzano ergab sich der Polizei sprachlos und ohne Widerstand, als eine Spezialeinheit ein offenbar leerstehendes Haus neben einer Schaffarm südlich von Palermo in der Nähe seiner Heimatstadt Corleone durchsuchte und dabei auf den Langgesuchten stieß. Zum Verhängnis wurde Provenzano, von dem nur ein Jahrzehnte altes Foto und ein Phantombild verfügbar waren, ein von der Polizei abgehörtes Telefongespräch mit einem Vertrauten, in dem die beiden einen Termin für die Übergabe von sauberer Wäsche abmachten.

Ein DNA-Test bestätigte die Identität des 73-Jährigen mit dem Spitznamen Binnu (= der Traktor – wegen seiner Dampfwalzen-Mentalität), der 1963 untertauchte und nach der Verhaftung seines Rivalen Salvatore Totò Riina 1993 zum unbestrittenen Anführer der Organisation aufstieg. Eine Spur führte die Ermittler unter anderem auch nach Deutschland, wo seine Ehefrau und seine beiden Söhne zeitweise gelebt hatten, die später aber angeblich nach Sizilien zurückkehrten.

Die Verhaftung des Mafiabosses wurde im allgemeinen mit Freude aufgenommen. Der italienische Innenminister Giuseppe Pisanu sagte: „Die Cosa Nostra hat ihren unangefochtenen Kopf verloren.“ Auch Präsident Ciampi gratulierte dem Chef-Mafiajäger Piero Grasso telefonisch zu dem Fahndungserfolg, der die Handlungsfähigkeit des italienischen Staates im Kampf gegen die Mafia unterstrich.