2013 horse meat scandal restaurant and pub industry, announced that some of its frozen burgers supplied by Silvercrest tested positive for horse DNA. A spokesman said that Makro no longer sold the product in question. On 14 February 2013, the French government stated that French meat processing company À la Table de Spanghero knowingly sold horse meat labelled as beef, and that their licence was suspended while an inquiry continues. Spanghero imported meat from Romania and sold it on to another French company, Comigel, which made frozen ready meals at its factory in Luxembourg. French Consumer Affairs Minister Benoît Hamon said the meat had
Criticism of Tesco Siratranont faced up to two years in jail and a £16.4m libel damages claim for saying that Tesco was expanding aggressively at the expense of small local retailers. Tesco served him with writs for criminal defamation and civil libel. The case was subsequently dismissed. In Thailand another controversy arose when the Royal Thai Police alleged that Thai soldiers operating as Tesco security intimidated a rural boy into poisoning chocolates as revenge for having their contracts revoked by the company. In a branch of Tesco near the bridge over the river Kwai, Tesco staff strip searched a young Thai girl twice