Counterfeit products worth Dh114 million seized in Dubai
Dubai: Counterfeit versions of branded products including women’s bags, belts and expensive watches worth Dh114.5 million were seized by Dubai Police in the first quarter of 2017.
Major General Khalil Ebrahim Al Mansouri, Assistant to the Dubai Police Chief for Criminal Investigation Affairs, said they recorded 71 cases this year relating to counterfeit goods, and arrested 77 suspects.
“Combating economic crimes is very important in Dubai as it affects the famous brands being sold here,” Maj-Gen Al Mansouri said.
“We use the latest technology to tackle such crimes and protect the rights of the legitimate brands. We provide protection to hundreds of famous brands. We work closely with the big companies and respond to any complaints regarding counterfeit products,” Maj-Gen Al Mansouri added.
Lear MoreMusician Malunga arrested over counterfeit products
Malawi police have confirmed arresting musician John Malunga for allegedly selling counterfeit products.
Malunga,36, was arrested on Monday this week by Mchinji police following the law-enforcers’ investigations established that he was producing and selling counterfeit Ruo Body Cleaner (Ufa wa Mbatata).
Originally Ruo Body Cleaner (Ufa wa Mbatata) is produced by C & NF, a Mulanje-based company which contracted the musician to promote and sell the product.
C & NF Managing Director, Crispin Jedegwa said were forced to engage police after his company discovered a counterfeit Ruo product on market. Mchinji police arrested the Zidzaululika star following a tip-off and seized the counterfeit products.
https://www.nyasatimes.com/musician-malunga-arrested-counterfeit-products/
Lear More
Koreans caught smuggling 2,348kg of gold in ‘private parts’
Dozens of Korean citizens were caught smuggling 2,348 kilograms of gold hidden in their “private parts,” the Korea Customs Service (KCS) said on Tuesday. It was the nation’s biggest smuggling bust.
Fifty-one people, including several housewives, were apprehended at Incheon International Airport early last month. The smuggling had been happening for about two years. Male smugglers were hiding five or six gold bars (3cm x 3cm), each weighting 200 grams, in their rectums while the women hid the gold in their rectums or vaginas.
The value of the gold was about 113.5 billion won ($100 million) â�� the highest value of gold confiscated in a single smuggling case. The smuggling happened from March 2015 and the gold came from Tokyo and China’s Yantai.
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/nation/2017/05/251_229920.html
Lear MoreIllicit trade, an invisible enemy: MP S Dev
“Tax evasion needs to be seen as an anti-national act and illicit trade should be treated as a national threat,” stated Sushmita Dev, Member of Parliament, Lok Sabha.
She further emphasized on the need for a national agency to take over to stop the menace of illicit trade at the event that organized by FICCI CASCADE on the ‘Impact of Illicit Trade on Industry, Economy and Consumers’ on Wednesday.
While addressing the occasion, Arun Chawla stated that, “India today has the potential to become a global manufacturing hub. However, widespread smuggling and counterfeiting, in the absence of an adequate enforcement mechanism to stop it, can act as a dampener in achieving this goal.”
FICCI’s Committee Against Smuggling and Counterfeiting Activities Destroying the Economy (CASCADE), over the years, has been actively focusing on curbing the problem of growing illicit trade in smuggled, pass-offs and counterfeit goods.
https://bureaucracytoday.com/latestnews.aspx?id=183145
Lear MoreIllicit trade, an invisible enemy: MP S Dev
“Tax evasion needs to be seen as an anti-national act and illicit trade should be treated as a national threat,” stated Sushmita Dev, Member of Parliament, Lok Sabha.
She further emphasized on the need for a national agency to take over to stop the menace of illicit trade at the event that organized by FICCI CASCADE on the ‘Impact of Illicit Trade on Industry, Economy and Consumers’ on Wednesday.
While addressing the occasion, Arun Chawla stated that, “India today has the potential to become a global manufacturing hub. However, widespread smuggling and counterfeiting, in the absence of an adequate enforcement mechanism to stop it, can act as a dampener in achieving this goal.”
FICCI’s Committee Against Smuggling and Counterfeiting Activities Destroying the Economy (CASCADE), over the years, has been actively focusing on curbing the problem of growing illicit trade in smuggled, pass-offs and counterfeit goods.
https://bureaucracytoday.com/latestnews.aspx?id=183145
Lear MoreIllinois Men Plead Guilty to Smuggling Untaxed Tobacco Products Into Minnesota
The Washington County Attorney’s Office has reached plea agreements with a pair of Illinois men accused of aiding and abetting the sale of untaxed tobacco, the Minnesota Department of Revenue announced in a release Wednesday.
Mohammad A.M. Abdul Majid of Bridgeview, Illinois, and Iman Gencehan Ugurlu of Oak Lawn, Illinois will each receive five years probation and have agreed to pay the state more than $74,000 in restitution.
The release states the charges stem from a traffic stop by the state patrol in which the men were reported to have been found in possession of more than $78,000 worth of untaxed tobacco products. According to the release, that was the largest known seizure of such products in state history.
Lear More
Ombudsman: Some 40% of all tobacco products sold in Russia are counterfeit
About 35-40 percent of tobacco products sold on the Russian market are illegally produced, Russian business ombudsman Boris Titov said in an annual report to the Russian president, TASS reports.
“According to most cautious estimates, the share of illegal products has already reached 35-40 percent, which deals a serious blow to the budget of the Russian Federation, not to mention the quality of the falsified products and the scope of illegal production,” the report reads.
The business ombudsman suggested creating a unified state mechanism to control the tobacco market, similar to the Unified State Automatic Information System for alcohol products (EGAIS), developed by the Department for State Regulation of Economy and the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade.
Lear MoreFake goods on the rise in India; illicit trade increases 44% in two years, new report shows
A study from the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) in India has revealed that the trade of fake goods in the country rocketed from 2011-2012 to 2013-2014. This confirmation that illicit goods are a pervasive part of the Indian economy – estimated to be between 8% and 15% of the country’s total gross domestic product (GDP) – serves as a stark reminder that the global trademark community urgently needs to focus awareness and enforcement efforts in the region.
The research was released by FICCI’s Committee Against Smuggling and Counterfeiting Activities Destroying Economy (CASCADE), which was set up in 2011 to explicitly address the growing illicit trade being witnessed in India. The primary aims of the committee are to generate awareness on the hazardous impact of counterfeit products in the country and to assist law enforcement agencies, including judges, the police and customs officials, in the fight against fakes. However, research evidencing the scale of the problem has also been a focus and its recent study, as well as a letter subsequently sent to the government, highlights a number of startling findings.
http://www.worldtrademarkreview.com/Blog/detail.aspx?g=5ac8d016-2fb8-4663-9319-b3142131a9f2
Lear MoreCombating Sale of Counterfeit and Falsified Medicines Online: A Losing Battle
The rapid growth of technology has transformed many brick-and-mortar businesses into online businesses, and medicines are now being sold over the internet. Influenced by the notions that online purchases are economical and do not require a prescription, the general public are keen to purchase medicine online through websites, social media and mobile apps. Online medicine purchase is presumed to be convenient and confidential, free from embarrassment of sharing personal and sensitive health information to a healthcare professional. Public in United States, Europe, Australia is generally aware that internet sales form part of the official medicines distribution channels, often a valid prescription is required for controlled medicine. However, unlicensed, substandard and falsified medicines with various dubious medical claims are advertised and sold illegally in many rogue online pharmacies (Jack, 2016). These include medications for weight loss, hair growth, and treatment of erectile dysfunction. Such medicines are termed as substandard, spurious, falsely labeled, falsified and counterfeit medical products by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Similarly, the European Commission defines such products as falsified medicines or fake medicines that pass themselves off as real, authorized medicines (European Commission, 2016). These medicines may contain substandard active ingredients, which are low quality and/or an incorrect amount, either too high or too low, and have not been properly evaluated by authorities in terms of quality, safety, and efficacy. It must be noted that falsified medicines are often confused with counterfeit medicines. According to European Commission, counterfeit medicines refers to medicines that do not comply with European Union law on intellectual and industrial property rights, for example, unregistered medicines sourced from parallel import (European Medicines Agency1). In this article, the illegal sales of both counterfeit and falsified medicines (CFMs) are discussed.
In 2012, the WHO estimated the CFMs industry to be worth USD 431 billion a year, but further estimates has not been reported in the recent years due to the fast growing, widespread practice of this industry, making it impractical to estimate on a global scale (Garrett,
2012). Authorities are finding it difficult to curb CFMs due to the lack of governance over the internet. Furthermore, fragmented cybercrime legislation leads to large substantive and procedural lacunae in law, rendering law enforcement efforts useless.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5432535/
Lear MoreRecord smuggling attempt thwarted in Poland
A record smuggling attempt of nine tonnes of tobacco was thwarted when Polish police found the contraband, worth PLN 5.5 million (EUR 1.2 million), in tins labelled as dog food.
The shipment was destined for Germany and was intercepted by police at the Polish-Slovak border crossing in Barwinek, southeastern Poland.
A Polish truck driver said he was transporting cans of dog food from Bulgaria to Germany, according to police.
But police found the cans were filled with tobacco from the UAE, intended for smoking in hookah water pipes. The driver has been detained.
Lear More