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Petraeus: Al Qaida Trying to 'Come Back In' U.S. military officials said there will be no significant reduction in coalition troops in the Baghdad area as part of an effort to stop the Al Qaida offensive in northern Iraq. They said Al Qaida was trying to reenter Baghdad and reverse its losses in 2007. "Al Qaida is trying to come back in," U.S. military commander Gen. David Petraeus said. "We can feel it and see it, and what we're trying to do is rip out any roots before they can get deeply into the ground." Read More Militants Assert...

The appearance of nuclear weapons materials on the black market is a growing global concern, and it is crucial that the United States reinforce its team of nuclear forensics experts and modernize its forensics tools to prepare for or respond to a possible nuclear terrorist attack. Large quantities of nuclear materials are inadequately secured in several countries, including Russia and Pakistan. Since 1993, there have been more than 1,300 incidents of illicit trafficking of nuclear materials, including plutonium and highly enriched uranium, both of which can be used to develop an atomic bomb. And these are only the incidents we...

As more and more schools turn to healthy snack alternatives, a candy black market is emerging. Some students now bring candy-laden backpacks to school to sell to other students for profit. http://www.vvdailypress.com/news/candy_5497___article.html/profit_sales.html What’s truly needed to stem the candy tide are more candy-control laws. If we can limit its sale, fewer children will be the victims of cavities, hyper-activity, and parental rage. There are especially dangerous brands of candy, infused with caffeine, that should be banned altogether. We need to offer tax-payer sponsored candy buy-back programs to get dangerous candy off the streets. A 7-day waiting period before children can...

Pair accused of peddling pieces from F-4, F-14 aircraft over the Internet By Nate Carlisle The Salt Lake Tribune 10/05/2007 12:09:12 PM MDT Federal prosecutors on Friday announced charges against two Ogden men accused of illegally selling parts for fighter jets over the Internet. Abraham Trujillo, 61, and David Waye, 22, both are charged with three counts of illegal arms exporting in federal court in Salt Lake City. The U.S. attorney's office says federal immigration agents discovered a Web site with listings of F-14 parts offered by Trujillo and his Ogden business, NSN Specialists. Over the next several months in...

China searches for 8 kg of "missing" uranium BEIJING (Reuters) - Eight kg (17 lb) of radioactive uranium has gone missing in China, delaying the verdict in a trial of four men charged with attempting to sell it on the black market, state media said on Friday. A court in Guangzhou, capital of China's southern province of Guangdong, heard the four tried to sell the material, which can be used in making nuclear weapons, between 2005 and January 2007, the China Daily said. The men were arrested in January after a potential buyer in Hong Kong reported them to the...

The Transparency International 2007 global report released on May 24 documents widespread Russian corruption and lack of independence in Russia's legal system, and its courts in particular. This, according to the report, is due to the government’s growing political interference. Novaya Gazeta, Russia’s best-known opposition newspaper, claims that corruption in Russia is the rule, and “business is impossible without it.” Moreover, Russian Minister of Economic Development and Trade German Gref, speaking at an investor conference in Moscow last week, admitted that "everyone knows the Taxation Service is corrupt." Leading investigative reporter Roman Shleinov claimed recently in London, that attempts to...

"Transplant tourism" on rise due to donor shortages By Laura MacInnis GENEVA - "Transplant tourism" is on the rise because organ donations are not keeping up with growing demand, especially for kidneys, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Friday. The United Nations agency said it was concerned about a rise in cases where people in countries such as Pakistan, Egypt and the Philippines were persuaded to sell their body parts to outsiders, mostly through a broker. The practice has increased over the past decade, said Luc Noel of the WHO's health technology and pharmaceuticals unit. "We believe 5 to...

Sigrid Fry-Revere is director of bioethics studies for the Cato Institute. Just last week, seven New York funeral home directors pleaded guilty to stealing organs from thousands of bodies, including that of broadcaster Alastair Cooke. Bizarrely enough, the federal government's looking to get in on the same action. At a meeting today and tomorrow, the Department of Health and Human Services Advisory Committee on Organ Transplantation is expected to recommend that states adopt policies of "presumed consent" for organ donation. In other words, authorities could harvest organs from your dead body without prior permission from you or your family. If...

September 11, 2006 Raising the Cigarette Tax is Bad Policy California Prop. 86 Should Be Defeated By: Matt Schumsky In less than two months, Californians will vote on a new $2.60 per pack tax on cigarettes. The new tobacco tax would bring the total cigarette tax to $3.47 a pack. The ballot measure to increase taxes by more than 250 percent is called Proposition 86, or the Tobacco Tax Act. According to California’s non-partisan Legislative Analyst, the total revenue from the Tobacco Tax Act of 2006 could be up to $2.1 billion. What will happen to this new revenue? The...

LOS ANGELES A Korean grocers' group sued former U.N. ambassador Andrew Young for libel for claiming that they and other market owners "ripped off" blacks. The suit, filed last week in Los Angeles County Superior Court, also names the Wal-Mart store chain and seeks at least $7.5 million in damages. The former Atlanta mayor resigned as head of a Wal-Mart advocacy group on Aug. 18 amid controversy over comments he made to the weekly, black-owned Los Angeles Sentinel. In an interview, Young said that Wal-Mart competition had forced smaller, "mom-and-pop" stores out of his neighborhood. "But you see, those are...

There were 103 confirmed incidents of illicit trafficking and other unauthorized activities involving nuclear and radioactive materials in 2005, newly released statistics from the Agency´s Illicit Trafficking Database (ITDB) show. The ITDB covers a broad range of cases from illegal possession, attempted sale and smuggling, to unauthorized disposal of materials and discoveries lost radiological sources. Eighteen of the confirmed incidents in 2005 involved nuclear materials; 76 involved radioactive material, mainly radioactive sources; two involved both nuclear and other radioactive materials, and seven involved radioactively contaminated materials. Another 57 incidents from previous years were reported. They involved illicit trafficking and other...

AQ Khan-esque N-trafficking continues: Jane’s WASHINGTON: Despite the break-up of Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan’s nuclear smuggling operation, there have been several indications in the past two years that trafficking activities along similar lines continue, according to Jane’s. In a news report circulated on June 16, the generally authoritative British publication said that portions of the AQ Khan network appear to be intact. Several officials involved in investigating the network’s activities said it now appears that parts of the organisation are yet to be uncovered and includes individuals who are more senior in the Khan network than previously believed. The...

Curse of the Bureaucrats Voodoo dolls are all the rage in China—especially now that the government has banned them. WEB EXCLUSIVE By Quindlan Krovatin Special to Newsweek Updated: 6:45 p.m. ET May 24, 2006 May 24, 2006 - Not content with jailing subversive reporters and restricting access to prodemocracy Web sites, the Chinese government has turned its attentions to a new destabilizing influence: voodoo dolls. Central government authorities are so bothered by the political implications of the dolls that they banned them entirely from Beijing's retail stores in April. The dolls have become increasingly popular among the Middle Kingdom's misanthropes...

WARSAW. DECEMBER 13. INTERFAX CENTRAL EUROPE - Poland's black economy in liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) may grow back above the current 6% level if the Finance Ministry fulfills its plans to increase excise tax by as much as five times to PLN 2 per liter, Andrzej Szczesniak, from industry watchdog, the Polish LPG Association (POGP), told Interfax on Tuesday. "Supervision is the most important here but, of course, when taxes rise strongly the black economy widens," Szczesniak said. According to POGP estimates, the black economy in LPG decreased from 50% in 2003 to 6% in 2005, mainly due to better...

Last updated: 16:21 - August 4, 2005 Police to investigate VNPT questionable deals The government has instructed the Ministry of Public Security to investigate cases involving questionable procurement deals at Vietnam’s largest State- owned telecom corporation, VNPT. The prime minister requests the Ministry of Public Security to report updated details of the case in which Nguyen Lam Thai (already arrested) sold monitoring cameras and advertisement billboards for SEA Games 22 in provincial post offices.

The anonymity of ammunition is being fought with the proposal of Assembly Bill 352, which, if passed, would require that every semiautomatic handgun sold after January 2009 be equipped with a new microstamping technology that would allow law enforcement officials to link the used bullet cases to the handguns from which they were fired. This new technology would stamp a serial number on to every bullet fired from a particular gun. That number would be linked to the owner of the gun in already existing database of gun owners. In a recent press release introducing the legislation, Assemblyman Paul Koretz...

On the day terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center, a Texas state trooper pulled over a rental van driven by a Middle Eastern man toward Houston. Opening the cargo door, the officer found a huge load of ... baby formula. False alarm? Not really. Police later identified the driver as a member of a terrorist group and linked him to a nationwide theft ring that specialized in reselling stolen infant formula, says Sgt. Johnnie Jezierski of the Special Crimes Service of the Texas Department of Public Safety. Proceeds were wired to the Middle East. The driver is still under investigation....

(Hammond) - Federal authorities say that two Hoosiers are part of an illegal cigarette ring. The US Attorney's office says 20 people have been charged as part of a ring that acquired cigarettes in Indiana then sold them across the border in Illinois without paying taxes. The suspects were arrested Tuesday. Authorities say the people acquired more than three million cigarettes in Indiana and then sold them in Illinois where taxes on cigarette sales are significantly higher. Each of the defendants was charged with five federal counts of shipping and selling contraband cigarettes. The two from northwest Indiana are 40-year-old...

THREE radioactive rockets capable of contaminating a city centre were offered for sale last week to a Sunday Times reporter posing as a middleman for Islamic terrorists. The Alazan rockets, which have a range of eight miles, were among 50,000 tons of weapons left behind at an arms dump in the breakaway eastern European republic of Transdniester when the Russian army withdrew after the cold war. They were offered to the reporter for $500,000 (£263,000) after he approached a senior officer in Transdniester’s secret police, claiming to represent a militant group in Algeria. The officer contacted a local arms dealer...

Shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles, or MANPADS (man-portable air defense systems), have proliferated throughout the world. They can be purchased on the military arms black market for as little as $5,000. More than two dozen terrorist groups, including Al Qaeda, are believed to possess such weapons. The FBI estimates that there have been 29 MANPADS attacks against civilian aircraft resulting in 550 deaths. At least 25 of the reported attacks have been attributed to non state actors. Even though a U.S. airliner has not been attacked by a missile, the question well may be when, not if, such an attack will happen....

U.S. Says Banned Nuclear Technology Went to Pakistan and India By DAVID S. CLOUD WASHINGTON, April 8 - Federal prosecutors investigating the smuggling of nuclear technology disclosed Friday that a South African businessman had pleaded guilty to arranging illegal exports of American-made equipment both to Pakistan and its regional rival, India. Asher Karni, an Israeli who lives in South Africa, entered the guilty plea last September and has been cooperating with investigators, prosecutors said. The prosecutors, however, kept the proceeding secret until Friday, when they unsealed the plea agreement and charges brought against Humayun Khan, an Islamabad businessman with longstanding...

Nicaraguan police, with U.S. assistance in a sting operation, thwarted black marketeers trying to sell SA-7 shoulder-fired missiles capable of downing commercial aircraft earlier this month, raising fears that some missiles already have been sold to terrorists, The Washington Times has learned.

AMERICA HAS TWO ECONOMIES, and one is flourishing at the expense of the other. First, there's the legitimate economy, in which craftsmen are licensed and employers and employees pay taxes. Then there's the fast-growing underground economy, where millions of nannies, construction workers and others are paid off-the-books, their incomes largely untaxed. The best guess as to the size of the output of this shadow economy is about $970 billion, or nearly 9% that of the real economy. It should soon pass $1 trillion. What is largely fueling the underground economy, experts say, is the nation's swelling ranks of low-wage illegal...

Owner of auto wrecking firm, worker allegedly sold gas from abandoned cars A Santa Rosa auto dismantling company owner and one of his employees face felony charges stemming from the illegal sale of gasoline from abandoned cars, police and prosecutors said Tuesday. Cream's Auto Dismantling obtained many of those cars under towing contracts with Sonoma County and the city of Santa Rosa, authorities said. Police said Santa Rosa would be terminating its contract with Cream's, which is worth an estimated $50,000 a year. Sonoma County administrators couldn't be reached to determine what would happen with that contract, which is worth...

The FAIRTAX: A TROJAN HORSE FOR AMERICA? By Claire Wolfe & Aaron Zelman You do not examine legislation in the light of the benefits it will convey if properly administered, but in the light of the wrongs it would do and the harms it would cause if improperly administered. -- Lyndon Baines Johnson, U.S. President “Abolish the IRS!” So goes the cry. And who could disagree? The income tax is unAmerican in the most profound way, punishing people for being successful. The tax code is vast and incomprehensible. The agency that enforces it is universally loathed. Yes, let's abolish...

The Unlucky Senator Kerry October 11, 2004 Alan Caruba by, www.anxietycenter.com Once you get passed the question of personality and character, it is fairly easy to see why Senator John F. Kerry will lose the forthcoming election. It’s what you don’t see that is the best predictor. What you don’t see are armies of anti-war protesters in the streets of American cities. Americans, whether they call themselves liberal or conservative, appear to be united when it comes down to the question of waging war against the Islamic Jihad. They may disagree on where or how, but they agree they do...

VIENNA, Austria -- An investigation of the black market supplying nations wanting nuclear arms has spread to more than 20 firms - some of them North American - the chief of the U.N. atomic agency told The Associated Press Friday. A senior diplomat identified one of the firms as U.S. based. Demanding anonymity, the diplomat also said the Syria and Saudi Arabia are also being investigated as possible buyer nations, beyond Iraq, Iran, Libya and North Korea - the countries known to have been in contact with Pakistani scientist A.Q. Khan and members of his procurement network. But the diplomat,...

When suicidal terrorists used commercial airliners as bombs on Sept. 11, 2001, it raised the prospect of even worse dangers: terrorists armed with chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear weapons, President Bush said in his weekly radio address today. "The possibility of secret and sudden attack with weapons of mass destruction is the greatest threat before humanity today," he emphasized. The president said America is confronting this danger with open eyes and unbending purpose. But he warned that America faces the possibility of catastrophic attack from ballistic missiles armed with weapons of mass destruction. "So we are developing and deploying missile...

  ‘Devil Siphon’ stopping Iraqi fuel black market By Pfc. J. H. French Soldiers of the 1/5th Field Artillery Bn, 1st Infantry Division, stop a truck loaded with propane as a part of Operation Devil Siphon in an effort to end black market fuel sales in the Ar Ramadi area. Pfc. J. H. French AR RAMADI, Iraq (Army News Service, Feb. 6, 2004) – In a country as oil rich as Iraq, fuel is in remarkably short supply. One reason is black marketers buy up the fuel to sell at elevated prices. “Operation Devil Siphon” is the 1st Infantry...

<p>ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - The father of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program and a top aide had black market contacts that supplied sensitive technology to Iran and Libya, and both have failed to account for funds in their bank accounts, intelligence officials told The Associated Press on Wednesday.</p>

British troops to train Libyans London January 26, 2004 Britain is planning to send troops to Libya to train Colonel Gaddafi's armed forces and take part in joint military exercises, the latest evidence of a remarkable thaw in relations between the countries. Ministry of Defence officials and army officers are just back from a secret visit to Libya. The Libyans had initially asked Britain to supply sophisticated missile systems as a "reward" for abandoning weapons of mass destruction, but the request was rejected, not least because Tripoli is still subject to a European Union arms embargo. But the British discussed...

Colonel Muammar Gadafy of Libya has been buying complete sets of uranium enrichment centrifuges on the international black market as the central element in his secret nuclear bomb programme, according to United Nations nuclear inspectors. The ease with which the complex bomb-making equipment was acquired has stunned experienced international inspectors. The scale and the sophistication of the networks supplying so-called rogue states seeking nuclear weapons are considerably more extensive than previously believed. The purchase of full centrifuges, either assembled or in parts, marks a radical departure in what is on offer on the black market, sources said. While it is...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- This month's arrest of a South Africa-based businessman accused of smuggling nuclear bomb triggers to Pakistan offers a rare window into the worldwide black market for nuclear weapons parts. Authorities accuse Asher Karni, 50, of being the middleman for a complex series of transactions involving dozens of the triggers. Agents arrested Karni Jan. 2 at Denver International Airport. Court documents say Karni used a series of front companies and misleading shipping documents to buy the devices from a Massachusetts company, have them sent through New Jersey to South Africa, then on to the United Arab Emirates and...

Joint Undercover Operation Links International Black Market to Virginia Mountains 1/7/04 3:09:00 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- To: State Desk Contact: Claire Comer of the Shenandoah National Park, 540-999-3183, Julia Dixon of the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries, 804-367-0991 RICHMOND, Va., Jan. 7 /U.S. Newswire/ -- At a joint press conference, the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries (VDGIF) and the National Park Service (NPS) announced the results of a multi-year, joint, undercover, investigation that has produced numerous wildlife violation charges and directly linked the communities surrounding Shenandoah National Park with the multi-million dollar international black market trade in...

MOSUL, Iraq - A dozen former leaders of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party have handed in weapons caches in northern Iraq to curry favor with the U.S. military and claim a role in a new Iraqi leadership, the commander of the Army's 101st Airborne Division said.   "They're coming to us, saying they want to be part of the new Iraq," Maj. Gen. David H. Petraeus said Thursday in an interview with The Associated Press. "It has slowly sunk in that Saddam isn't coming back." Separately, the 101st Airborne has paid more than $20,000 in rewards in recent weeks to a...

Medicaid Being Used To Supply Black Market Drugs Authorities say some Medicaid recipients in Kentucky are using their benefits to sell prescription drugs illegally for profit or to supply their own addictions. Police and prosecutors in rural Kentucky say the state, and federally funded program that helps more than 670-thousand of the state's elderly, poor and disabled is a significant source of drugs that have ravaged the region. It's impossible to estimate the degree to which Medicaid is used to funnel prescription drugs into Kentucky's black market. Some police say Medicaid abuse is among the biggest sources of street-level...

Coalition personnel are working with the Iraqi Ministry of Oil to head off gasoline smuggling, sabotage of the oil industry infrastructure and black-market profiteering. Officials said these continue to be among the greatest problems facing the Iraqi people. Coalition spokesman Dan Senor and Army Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, the operations deputy at Combined Joint Task Force 7, briefed the press in Baghdad today. Senor talked about steps the coalition is making to combat the gas shortage that is plaguing life in Iraq. Senor cited a number of causes to the gasoline shortage, which has made for long gas lines at...

BEARDSTOWN, Ill. — As Beardstown residents struggled to find common ground with their new neighbors, one issue kept them apart: Many of the Hispanics working at Excel Corp.’s slaughterhouse were living illegally in the United States. By 1998, Excel’s work force had grown to nearly 2,000 employees, about 30 percent of them Hispanic. Although the company denied it knowingly hired undocumented workers, it was an open secret that most of the Hispanics — perhaps as many as 80 percent — had purchased false identification to get their jobs. To protect themselves, the undocumented residents avoided the rest of the townspeople....

BAGHDAD, Iraq – Soldiers of Task Force 1st Armored Division’s 2nd Brigade, 82nd Airborne captured 28 fuel trucks and nine propane trucks illegally dispensing fuel as part of black market activity in a south Baghdad neighborhood at about 10 p.m. Dec. 18. Soldiers also detained 20 black marketers. The arrests were part of Operation IRON JUSTICE. The operation is intended to combat corruption both to improve quality of life for the Iraqi populace and to deny former regime elements illegal sources of income.

NEWS RELEASEHEADQUARTERS UNITED STATES CENTRAL COMMAND7115 South Boundary BoulevardMacDill AFB, Fla. 33621-5101Phone: (813) 827-5894; FAX: (813) 827-2211; DSN 651-5894 November 11, 2003Release Number: 03-11-11 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE SOLDIERS, COMMITTEE MEET TO SOLVE BLACK MARKET PROBLEMS ISKANDARIYAH, Iraq – Coalition Forces recently met with Iraq’s Fuel Committee to address the selling of fuel on the black market. Fuel vendors must now follow certain actions to receive and distribute their product. Every fuel vendor has been assigned one fuel card per container. The vendors use these cards to receive fuel from the distributors. These must be turned into the council in...

Liquor in U.S. Military Base Is Stolen through Underground Tunnel SEPTEMBER 04, 2003 23:07 by Ji-Wan Cha ( cha@donga.com) [SEOUL, KOREA] (S. Korean) Customs Office unearthed customs dodgers who smuggled out duty-free beer from U.S. military bases through an underground tunnel. According to Seoul Customs, suspects, known as Lee (34) and Song (48), a Post Exchange manager, were arrested yesterday by the Seoul Prosecutors‘ Office. They were under suspicions of illegally trafficking 2 billion won-worth duty-free liquors out of U.S. military bases and distributing them in imported goods shops in traditional marketplaces in Seoul, which is a violation of...

<p>When it comes to laundering cold-blooded contraband, few states top Pennsylvania.</p> <p>Dogged by lax law enforcement, weak statutes and a wink-wink attitude from the industry that sells reptiles and amphibians, Pennsylvania has become what top wildlife cops nationwide call a "black hole" state -- the place to move animals illegal for sale everywhere else.</p>

Arms smuggling from Egypt to the PA via Gaza has reached catastrophic proportions, Israeli security experts say. Hundreds of weapons, thousands of bullets, and tremendous amounts of other ammunition make their way every day via the tunnels under Rafiach to Hamas and Islamic Jihad storehouses in Khan Yunis and Gaza City. Egypt is doing little to stop the smuggling, and the Palestinian Authority is doing nothing to stop it. The PA is in fact ignoring all evidence of terrorist preparations for the end of the hudna ceasefire. Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists practice shooting and other military activity in broad...

Federal regulators are overwhelmed by a tidal wave of counterfeit and unapproved prescription drugs entering the United States from other countries and must revamp their procedures to protect the health of Americans, congressional investigators said Tuesday. Grilled by the investigators, a senior Food and Drug Administration official was unable to estimate how many prescription drugs enter the country illegally each year or how fast the shipments are growing. The Republican chairman of a House committee said the growth rate could be as much as 1,000 percent over the past two years... While Taylor declined to estimate the size of the...

10% of Germans work on black market Ten per cent of all Germans work on the black market, according to a study commissioned by Danish foundation Rockwool. The study claims that the black market accounts for 4.1 per cent of Germany's GDP. A Copenhagen-based group of researchers interviewed more than 5,500 Germans between 18 and 74 years of age in 2001, of which 10.4 per cent said that they had earned money in the previous year on which they had not paid tax. The researchers also interviewed a similar group of people in the UK, Denmark, Norway and Sweden. In...

ITALIAN police have arrested four Ukrainians believed to be part of an international crime ring in which women gave birth to babies in order to sell their organs. In co-ordinated raids in two Italian cities, they arrested a man and three women. One was the mother of a baby born just days ago. The gang had attempted to sell the baby to undercover officers for 50,000 (£35,844). The four have been charged with attempted enslavement as well as other crimes. "We are looking at an extremely dangerous form of criminality," investigating magistrate Gianrico Carofiglio told a news conference in the...

With pot and porn outstripping corn, America's black economy is flying high Illegal migrants provide the muscle for US black market Duncan Campbell in Los Angeles Friday May 2, 2003 The Guardian Marijuana, pornography and illegal labour have created a hidden market in the United States which now accounts for as much as 10% of the American economy, according to a study. As a cash crop, marijuana is believed to have outstripped maize, and hardcore porn revenue is equal to Hollywood's domestic box office takings. Despite laws that punish marijuana cultivation more strictly than murder in some states, Americans spend...

<p>Baghdad -- More evidence has surfaced that the looting of the National Museum was carried out in part by professional art thieves who used chaos as cover to make off with artifacts sought by private collectors, museum officials said.</p> <p>The officials said financiers from countries like Saudi Arabia, Iran and Jordan have been paying people since the end of the 1991 Gulf War to smuggle specific items from the sites of archaeological digs around the country.</p>

MOST works of art stolen from Iraqi museums by looters will resurface on the world art market, a German expert has said. "That is what happened after the first Gulf War," Ulli Seegers, from the Art Loss Register (ALR), which manages the world's largest database of stolen artwork, told the DPA news agency. "The museums would not have been ransacked if there were not an international market for the works," she said. The ALR is expecting to receive a detailed list of stolen works, in order to trace them on the art market. "Whether in fairs or auctions, we watch...

Tainted blood deals raise international furor --------------------------------------------------------- Reprinted under the fair use doctrine of international copyright law: Austria investigates allegations of tainted-blood exports Lancet 2000; 356: 919 - 922 (9 September) The trail of blood plasma infected with HIV, hepatitis, and syphilis exported from South Africa to European companies is being investigated by the police and health authorities in Austria, Switzerland, and the UK. There are apprehensions that unscrupulous brokers relabelled these contaminated products before selling them off to China and India, while earning millions of dollars, and endangering many lives. A confidential investigation by Wilbert Bannenberg of the South...