MOSCOW, May 2 (RIA Novosti) - Police broke up a crime ring producing counterfeit CDs and DVDs in a raid Tuesday on the city of Tver, about 100 miles north of Moscow, the Interior Ministry said.
Law-enforcement agencies seized over a million fake CDs and DVDs during the raid, a ministry official said.
"An organized criminal group of employees of OOO Intertrade was packaging, storing and producing counterfeit DVDs and CDs," said the first deputy head of the ministry's economic crimes department, Yury Samofalov.
He said packaging materials and holographic labels had also been seized. An investigation has been launched.
A licensed DVD in Russia costs about 350 rubles ($13) or more, while a pirated copy can be bought for 150 rubles ($5.50) or less.
Samofalov also said almost 230,000 allegedly counterfeit discs had been discovered in the Moscow Region town of Khimki.
"During a check at storehouses and assembly rooms leased by OOO DVD Klassik ... 227,000 disks with signs of counterfeiting were discovered, including 1,700 with pornographic content, as well as 304,000 packaging and printing items," he said.
