by FFE EU News staff

Italian police confiscated around 320,000 pieces of counterfeit luxury handbags and accessories from sweatshops in Vicenza, northern Italy.

Operations in Bergamo also led to the shutting down of 15 websites posing as official retailers of top fashion brands but selling illegal luxury goods.

The operations were the latest in the ongoing crack down of illegal vendors of fake luxury goods. To date, the police have seized 64 million fake goods and arrested 50 people “affiliated with criminal groups.”

Fake designer bags for sale in Rome. File photo: Gabriel Bouys/AFP

A police video of the operations showed officers from the financial crimes police in Vicenza tearing down partitions in a sweatshop to reach the goods. Among these were labels from top fashion brands Prada, Fendi, Armani Jeans, D&G, Louis Vuitton and Roberto Cavalli.

According to a police statement, production of the fake goods was based in the regions of Campania around Naples in the south and in Lombardy around Milan in the north. They also said that Italians, Romanians, Senegalese and Moroccans were running the organization.

The trading of fake luxury goods is rampant in Italy despite crack downs made by police. These items are usually sold by unlicensed street vendors in tourist hotspots.