Greece Combats Illegal Gambling
- Written by Maria Athens
Illegal gambling is a growing concern in Greece; over 5 billion euros per year are placed in illicit bets, as confirmed by General Secretary for Transparency Giorgos Sourlas to Public Order Minister Vassilis Kikilias, today in Athens.
The General Secretary is striving to combat the outlawed gaming and declared it is: "...harming the national economy and acting as a mechanism for laundering ill-gotten gains", as reported by Kathimerini.
Sourlas stated to Kikilias that efforts are being implemented: "...which make us optimistic that an end will be put to organized crime rings operating without constraint", after meeting with the Hellenic Gaming Commission chief Evgenios Giannakopoulos.
Last month in a Kathimerini interview, the Commission leader commented, "In the illegal market, EEEP figures estimate there are between 60,000 and 100,000 illegal gaming machines at non-licensed gambling spots, and a conservative guess puts their turnover at between 4 and 5 billion euros. Their gross profits should come to 1.5 billion, not including online gambling, which had a turnover of about 1 billion euros".
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