MORE than 500 bottles of foreign wines lacking Chinese labels were seized from a store in Luohu District by law enforcement officers during an unexpected inspection Monday afternoon, the Shenzhen Special Zone Daily reported.

The store, which is located near the entrance of a housing estate in Luohu, has a wide variety of wines including red wine, liquor and foreign wine. Some of the wine cabinets were locked while others were open.

Upon a closer look, the officers from the municipal food and drug administration discovered that nearly all of the foreign wines in the store lacked the required Chinese labels and price tags.

On the second floor, boxes of Macallan whiskey and Japanese sake were found with the same problem. “It’s very rare for a store to sell wine without Chinese labels in such great quantities and in an undisguised way,” said an officer.

Although the clerks were told to inform their boss, the owner of the store didn’t show up. When asked to turn on the computer and cash register, the clerks were reluctant to cooperate.

As of 5 p.m. that afternoon, hundreds of bottles of wine from unknown sources had been boxed up and carried way.

The confiscated wine was estimated to be worth over 2 million yuan (US$302,471).

(Zhang Yu)