ROME — Police officers in Italy swooped down on a Chinese mafia organization on Thursday, arresting 33 people on suspicion of running a criminal enterprise that dominated the transport of Chinese products in Europe, financed with money from prostitution, gambling and drugs.

The mass arrests captivated attention in Italy, where the term mafia originated, and provided a glimpse into the extensive economic tentacles of Chinese gangsters in Europe.

The network’s headquarters was in Prato, a Tuscan city northwest of Florence that has long been home to a large Chinese community that manufactures low-priced garments. It had affiliates in Paris, Madrid and Neuss, Germany, as well as in some northern Italian cities and in Rome, where the group’s leader lived, the police said in announcing results of a seven-year investigation.

The police operation broke up “a dangerous organization that had used force to take control of trucking, and was financed by its illegal activities,” Interior Minister Marco Minniti said in a statement.