Customs raids HMV

HMV was assisting a customs investigation into its alleged illegal sale of parallel-imported movie DVDs, a spokeswoman for the retail chain confirmed yesterday.

Local film industry figures yesterday hailed customs' recent crackdown on parallel imports and urged the government to keep up its action.

The spokeswoman confirmed officers had searched some Hong Kong of HMV outlets on Thursday and taken away DVDs of two films - W., scheduled to premiere in Hong Kong next month, and Vicky Cristina Barcelona, shown here in October last year.

The customs operation followed complaints by the local distributors of the two films.