Police banned funeral processions for two of six Italians gunned down in Germany in a suspected mafia feud when they were buried in southern Italy today.
Extra police were drafted in to the mountain villages of Calabria to prevent further violence in the 16-year-old feud inside the underworld organisation, known as the 'Ndrangheta, which has claimed up to 20 lives.
In the white church of the village of Siderno, about 200 family and friends gave brothers Francesco and Marco Pergola, aged 22 and 20, a noisy send-off.
"We applaud our brothers Francesco and Marco," shouted one man outside the church. People clapped as the two coffins were rushed off to the cemetery.
Police decided the funerals could go ahead because the situation in San Luca and nearby villages, epicentre of the feud, "doesn't give particular cause for alarm". But the usual funeral processions to the church and graveyard were banned.
Because of hostility to the media, police advised reporters not to enter the churches while the funerals were taking place.
Siderno's mayor, Alessandro Figliomeni, described the slain brothers' family as "hard working and law abiding". Their father and uncle were both policemen.
He urged the media not to portray all locals as mobsters, saying: "We Calabrians are doubly punished as we have to live with the problem of organised crime and of media coverage that ruins the image of a region where most people are honest."