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LAST year, Customs officers working at EU borders intercepted 43,000 shipments of pirated products, compared to 37,000 the previous year.

A third of these contained cigarettes, with clothing and fashion accessories the second most common items to be found.

There were large increases in the quantity of fake cosmetics (a 264% rise), toys (twice as many) and medicines (up 51%). However, seizures of fake CDs, DVDs and cassettes dropped by nearly 80%, because many of these are now available to download from the internet.