120,000 pirated music CDs discovered by police

Police on Thursday seized 120,000 pirate music CDs and nabbed a dozen counterfeiters in a pair of early morning raids.

The crackdown, carried out in the northern city of Taoyuan and southern city of Tainan, came after two months of surveillance following a tip from the London-based International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI, 國際唱片業交流協會).

In Tainan City, police seized more than 100,000 CDs from a warehouse and captured 11 mem-bers of the counterfeiting ring.

In a second raid, police raided a warehouse in Taoyuan, discovering more than 20,000 pirated music CDs and VCDs. The street value of the illegal discs was estimated to exceed NT$6 million.

The two counterfeiting rings were not connected, according to police, who estimated the 120,000 CDs could have been sold for NT$40 million (US$1.2 million).

"We are very happy that we have cracked the counterfeiting rings," IFPI's Taiwan supervisor Luo Kuo-jui (羅國瑞) said.

"It shows Taiwan's determination to fight recorded music piracy and to protect intellectual property."