Russian police bust $30 million contraband cheese ring

Russian police said Tuesday they have busted an global ring involved in producing contraband cheese worth about 2 billion rubles ($30 million), arresting six people.

Moscow region police accused the six people arrested of using half a tonne of banned rennet, a curdling agent, to make the cheese.

Last year, the government of Moscow banned a number of products from the EU and the U.S.as a response to Western sanctions over the situation in eastern Ukraine, which the West claims Russian Federation is provoking. Labels were used to falsely identify the cheese as having come from known foreign cheese makers and the produce was sold in distribution outlets in Moscow and Saint Petersburg.

The gang could face fraud charges punishable by up to 10 years in jail, police said.

This follows a decree signed by President Vladimir Putin, ordering that food breaching sanctions be destroyed. Authorities have warned that the embargoed products could prove harmful.

But that has not put off officials and Russia’s general prosecutor on Tuesday launched a hotline for citizens to report illicit Western cheeses and pates to the authorities.

The destruction of Western food has prompted criticism from politicians and activists and a rare outcry from ordinary Russians, who say the produce could feed the country’s poorest.

In recent weeks, in tacit acknowledgment that the ban has been widely violated, Russia’s agricultural oversight agency Rosselkhoznadzor has been publicizing the destruction of tons of contraband food. As of Monday, 321 tons of animal products have been seized, of which 48 tons have been destroyed, the agency, Rosselkhznadzor, said.

“Unscrupulous traders are importing these products without subjecting them to any quality control or adhering to transport and storage conditions, which could endanger people’s health”, prosecutors said in an online statement.