Ukraine Gambling Regulator Official Under Arrest

Back in August 2020 the President of Ukraine signed the bill to legalise gambling again in the country and a year further on and it has been announced that one of the members of the gambling regulatory commission has been arrested on charges of corruption.

The countries anti-corruption department NABU, issued a statement stating that an unnamed member of the Commission for the Regulation of Gambling and Lotteries (KRAIL) had been held on charges for receiving $90,000 in a bride for the “assisting and granting of permits and licenses in relation to gambling.”

Ukraine closed down all gambling activities in 2009 following widespread corruption and the heavy involvement of organised criminals within the industry, now less than a year since legalised gambling is back on the agenda and already corruption again has been recognised once more.

This development will again bring into question whether any regulated gambling in the country can be free of corruption. Although the charges against the high ranking official at KRAIL are yet to be proven and those charged are innocent to proven guilty, it is a huge embarrassment to the government that already the legitimacy of the regulator is called into question.