China's official response to an Italian request for mutual legal assistance never got beyond the post office in Rome, Reuters reports.
The documents, relating to a 2024 assassination attempt on a Chinese businessman in Italy, arrived at the Justice Ministry in Rome in early February via the regular postal service. As is often the case, receipt of the envelope required a delivery charge.
But two sources familiar with the situation told Reuters that no one at the Italian ministry's post office knew the package was due to arrive, so staff refused to pay, sending the envelope back to China unopened.
One of Reuters' sources said that after the mistake was discovered, the Ministry of Justice asked the Chinese authorities to resend the materials, but the documents have not yet been received.
Reuters notes that this embarrassing episode reflects a broader sense of distrust and paralysis in Italy over Beijing's willingness to offer cooperation to Rome. The blockade frustrates some prosecutors, who say it hinders their fight against Chinese gangs that run multibillion-euro criminal networks in Italy.
Chinese criminality has expanded strongly in Italy
Italian prosecutors have opened dozens of investigations over the past decade into illicit banking, drug rings, extortion, worker abuse, illegal immigration, tax evasion, murders and gang wars within Italy's Chinese diaspora.
Only a few cases made it to court.
Investigators say they need Beijing's help to penetrate groups operating with their counterparts in China, but getting that cooperation is met with resistance domestically, including in Italy.
Beijing, however, took a first step towards deeper collaboration last year.
In September, Chinese authorities wrote to Luca Tescaroli, the chief prosecutor in Prato, the Tuscan city with one of Italy's largest Chinese communities and the epicenter of an alleged Chinese organized crime ring accused of trying to control the highly profitable logistics of fast fashion in Europe.
Authorities in Beijing proposed a meeting and sent a high-ranking delegation – including a senior police officer and officials from China's Ministry of Public Security – to Prato on November 25, 2025.
“This willingness to cooperate was an epochal development,” Tescaroli told Reuters.
Italian authorities do not believe that Beijing is interested in combating economic crime on the peninsula
But three senior sources told Reuters that there was no meeting to follow up contacts afterwards, as resistance from various Italian law enforcement agencies slowed efforts to develop the channel.
A judicial source said there was concern in Rome that China's cooperation was focused on violent crime and was not interested in the many investigations by prosecutors in Milan, Brescia, Florence and Rome into vast money-laundering operations through so-called Chinese “underground banks”.
China's Foreign Ministry said Beijing is willing to strengthen law enforcement cooperation with Italy to combat transnational crime. The Chinese consulate in Florence said China “naturally cooperates with all countries” to combat criminal activities and protect the rights of the Chinese community.
Barbara Sargenti, Italy's national anti-Mafia prosecutor, who is coordinating internal and external investigations, said there was still no agreement on the best way forward.
“There have been and continue to be discussions through the Ministry of Justice. The question is whether there is both the opportunity and the benefit, for both parties, to continue down this path,” she told Reuters.
