Antigua Fights Back Tells US Online Poker Shutdown illegal
Apr 22, 2011
(Reuters)
- The United States violated global trade law by shutting
down Internet gambling sites based in Antigua and
elsewhere and prosecuting their owners, according
to Antigua and Barbuda officials considering action
in the World Trade Organization.
Antigua and Barbuda, which licenses Internet gambling
companies, has waged a long battle in the WTO over
U.S. efforts to keep Americans from patronizing offshore
betting sites. Last week's shutdown of the three biggest
online poker sites has the Caribbean nation ready
to go another round.
It
contends U.S. crackdowns against foreign betting sites
are illegal and protectionist, since gambling for
money is permitted in U.S. casinos and since online
betting is allowed for state-regulated horse racing
in the United States.
"I don't think there's another country in the
world that puts people in jail for engaging in trade
that's lawful under international law," Mark
Mendel, the Caribbean government's legal advisor,
told Reuters by telephone on Thursday. "It's
as if Antigua would put Americans in jail for selling
pineapples."
U.S.
prosecutors in New York seized the domain names of
three online poker sites last week, shutting them
down and charging their owners with $3 billion of
fraud and money laundering.
Prosecutors charged that the three foreign-registered
companies tricked regulators and banks into processing
illegal online gaming proceeds from U.S. customers.
U.S. prosecutors allowed two of the companies -- PokerStars,
which is incorporated in the Isle of Man, and Full
Tilt Poker, which is incorporated in Ireland -- to
reopen their websites on Wednesday so players could
withdraw funds from their accounts and so people outside
the United States could resume playing.
Prosecutors said the third company, Antigua-based
Absolute Poker, could do likewise if it agreed, as
the others did, to prohibit U.S. customers from playing
for anything of value and to appoint an independent
monitor to enforce that agreement.
Antigua's finance minister, Harold Lovell, issued
a statement on Wednesday calling the shutdown an illegal
attempt to squelch competition.
"I am concerned that at this point in time United
States authorities continue to prosecute non-domestic
suppliers of remote gaming services in clear contravention
of international law," Lovell said.
JOBS, REVENUE FOR ANTIGUA
Online gambling is the tiny island nation's second-largest
employer after tourism, according to the Journal of
International Commerce and Economics. Antigua says
its betting operators have every right to offer their
services to American consumers, and the WTO has agreed.
It ruled in 2005 that the United States violated international
agreements on trade in services by prosecuting the
operators of offshore Internet gambling sites. The
WTO rejected the U.S. argument that the restrictions
were necessary to protect public morality.
