By Antonino Condorelli
Reuters

SAN LUCA, Italy (Reuters) - Police banned funeral processions for five of six Italians gunned down in Germany in a suspected mafia feud when they were buried in southern Italy on Thursday.

Extra police were drafted in to the mountain villages of Calabria to prevent further violence in a 16-year-old feud inside the Calabrian underworld organization, the ‘Ndrangheta, that has claimed up to 20 lives.

In a small church in the village of San Luca, at the epicenter of the feud, hundreds gathered to say goodbye to Sebastiano Strangio, Marco Marmo and Francesco Giorgi, who at 17 years old was the youngest victim.

As is the custom, men waited outside the church while women attended the service, fanning themselves in the August heat.

“The life we live does not seem like ‘life’ any more,” said Pino Strangio, the parish priest, quoted by ANSA news agency.

“Looking at your coffins, we discover how love has turned to hatred … Tragedy is growing like an unstoppable cancer.”

In the nearby village of Siderno, family and friends gave brothers Francesco and Marco Pergola, aged 22 and 20, a noisy send-off. As in San Luca, people clapped in a show of respect as the two coffins were rushed off to the cemetery.

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