Italy's top mafia boss Ernesto Fazzalari arrested after 20 years on the run

ROME (APP) - One of Italy's most wanted mafia bosses was arrested on Sunday after two decades on the run from a life sentence for murder, the authorities announced.

Ernesto Fazzalari, 46, was captured in the early hours of the morning in an apartment in a remote part of the southern region of Calabria, home to the notorious 'Ndrangheta organised crime syndicate.

Fazzalari was the second most-wanted 'Ndrangheta fugitive after "superboss" Matteo Messina Denaro. On the run since 1996, he was convicted in absentia in 1999 of mafia association, kidnapping, illegal possession of weapons and a double homicide linked to a bloody 1989-91 feud which left 32 people dead in his home town of Taurianova.

His arrest was hailed by the government as a significant victory for the state in its battle against what is now considered to be Italy's most powerful mafia group.