Thousands of bottles of counterfeit whisky found in a container from the Far East headed to Libya have been confiscated by the Customs Department.

The container, which stopped at Malta Freeport, was declared to be carrying sofas and was selected for scanning.

The scan showed that the container was carrying other items besides sofas.
When officials opened it, they found 7,200 bottles of whisky, 6,000 of which were of well known firms and prestigious names.

A close examination of the labels raised the officials’ suspicions and the legal representatives of the whisky firms concerns were contacted and given samples for testing.

Further investigations established that this whisky was not produced by the firms indicated on the labels.