BUYING PIRATE CDS 'FINANCES DRUG TRAFFIC'

Consumers buying cheap pirate CDs and cassettes were accused by
international record industry bosses yesterday of financing
international drug-smuggling and prostitution rackets through "greed
or stupidity".

Organised crime was responsible for a 20% rise in illegal CD
production worldwide last year, with the mafia and drug barons gaining
ascendancy, while piracy through the internet was the latest
fast-growing threat to the lawful pounds 25bn a year music business,
according to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry.

It estimated a pounds 3bn trade, in street prices, and said billions
more was being lost in taxes and investment in jobs and talent.
Officials detailed huge seizures, including the discovery of 22m
pirated products in one raid in Hong Kong, the busting of a pounds
60,000 a week mafia operation in Naples, and the recovery of 15m CDs
over 11 months in South America, most of which had come from Asian
factories via central America.

Iain Grant, head of enforcement at the IFPI, said: "The consumer who
buys a pirate CD in a Sunday market may be putting money up for a drug
consignment.

"The money is generated by people who have no scruples," Mr Grant
said. The gangs were also involved in narcotics, prostitution and
alien smuggling. In one operation, Hong Kong authorities had
intercepted a fishing trawler towing a concrete bridge support
carrying pirate CDs worth pounds 375,000.

The IFPI said the bulk of the international crime was linked to CDs,
and there might be as many as 400m pirate copies made each year in
factories that could be set up in large rooms. About 1.6m cassettes
were produced illegally also, but these usually were made as a garage
industry for local markets.

Piracy in Britain is thought to run at less than 10%, compared with
well over half in countries such as the Ukraine, Bulgaria, Poland,
Russia, China, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Israel, Paraguay and Peru.

Derek Varnals, of the British phonographic industry, said British
consumers could be greedy or stupid - "greedy in that they don't care
where the money goes or stupid in that they think a pounds 5 CD at a
car boot sale is legitimate."