Brussels, 23/06/2008 (Agence Europe) - On Friday 20 June, the European Commission confirmed that it had carried out unannounced inspections at the premises of several producers of consumer detergents washing up liquid and dishwasher detergents etc. The Commission has reason to believe that EC rules on restrictive business practices and price fixing may have been violated. According to the press, the raids took place on Tuesday 17 and Thursday 19 June and targeted Unilever, Procter & Gamble, Henkel, Reckitt Benckiser and Sara Lee. National investigations were recently carried out in several member states by competition authorities in the household goods sector. In Germany, Sara Lee, Henkel and Unilever were fined €137 million by the national authorities for illegal agreements on their product prices. The industry has denied any connection between the national investigations and raids carried out by Commission officials. The latter has refused to comment on any possible link between them. (C.D./trans.rh)