It was intended as a cunning ruse to evade surveillance by anti-mafia police.

When a bunch of alleged mobsters held their meetings inside a giant fridge in a town in Sicily, they were convinced that the thick insulating walls would protect them being eavesdropped on by police.

But detectives had got wind of the secret summits that were regularly held in the fruit and veg lock-up and had planted recording devices inside, in an operation they code-named “Freezer”.

The supposedly secret meeting resulted in the arrest of six alleged members of a mafia clan linked to Matteo Messina Denaro, a Cosa Nostra kingpin who has been on the run since 1993. His whereabouts are such a mystery, and his evasion of police so successful for more than two decades, that he has been nicknamed The Ghost.