Albania leftist prime minister, Edi Rama has threatened to shut down online gambling sites operating in Albania, complaining that his countrymen spend between Euro 500 – 600 million a year, money that leaves the country.
Rama said Friday that his coalition government intends to draw up legislation banning offshore betting websites in a bid to stop the financial drain from one of Europe’s poorest nations.
The coalition government that Rama leads with his Socialist Party achieved a landslide victory in the parliamentary elections in June this year, and since then officials have checked some 1,300 casinos and betting shops from cities to remote villages, closing down many of them and suing their owners for operating illegally or on tax evasion charges.