Nearly 20m illicit medical products worth an estimated $14m have been seized in Operation Qanoon, an Interpol-led operation targeting criminal networks in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). The localised operation coincided with the coronavirus pandemic, and as with the global Operation Pangea XIII reported in March uncovered high numbers of counterfeit personal protective equipment (PPE) like masks and hand sanitiser. Among the illegal products seized were 61,000 respiratory masks and an artificial respirator in Morocco, 63,000 face masks and 360 sanitising products in Jordan, and 85,000 medical products – facemasks, gloves, thermometers, medical glasses, etc – in Qatar. Medical products seized included syringes, suture threads, surgical adhesive tapes and electronic blood glucose readers. The scale of this iteration of Operation Qanoon was much larger than the last in 2018, which netted 1.5m products.

Source: The North Africa Journal July 22, 2020 12:33 UTC