After scouring the internet to see whether the Russian authorities have capitulated on their ban on casinos and gaming halls (which they have not), which came into force on 1st July 2009, it seems that the main loop-hole in the ban has been plugged.
Weeks ago, we reported that Vladimir Putin’s law of 2006 to ban casinos and gaming halls in all but 4 “Gambling Zones” (all to be located in various far-flung parts of the Russian Federation), had come to pass at the beginning of July. Simultaneously, we predicted that many of the established casinos would try to circum-navigate the new law, by renaming themselves as “poker clubs”. This was because, back when the law banning gambling was created, poker was put into the category of an “official sport”, and thus not counted as “gambling”.
Towards the end of July however, the Kremlin closed up this loop-hole by reclassifying the game as an act of gambling and thus making it illegal, saying that the games classification as a “sport” had been an “error”.
Tags: Russina gambling industry
This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 11th, 2009 at 1:58 am and is filed under Blog, News.
