Twenty suspects in what is believed to be the country's biggest online gambling case went on trial today in Kunming, Yunnan Province. Prosecutors at Kunming Intermediate People's Court told judges that the case involved about 8.68 billion yuan (USD 1.24 billion) in wagered money and more than 200 million yuan in illegal profits, the report said. One of the gambling Website's allegedly operated by the defendants attracted 5,198 registered users from August 2006 to March 2007, prosecutors said.

The Court of Final Appeal of Macao Special Administrative Region (SAR) has sentenced former SAR Secretary for Public Works and Transport Ao Man Long to 27 years in jail. The 51-year-old official is guilty of 57 of the 76 charges, which include corruption, money laundering, abuse of power and related crimes. In his over two-hour long readout of a summary of the verdict on Wednesday, TUI President Sam Hou Fai said in light of Ao’s bribery cases and related illicit activities of money laundering...

Crown casino chiefs have been ordered to go to trial over claims they allowed a banned problem gambler to blow USD 30 million. Supreme Court Justice David Harper today ruled that the Southbank casino had a case to answer in its explosive dispute with millionaire Gold Coast property developer Harry Kakavas. Mr Kakavas, 40, alleges he lost USD 30 million playing baccarat in a 14-month gambling spree starting in June 2005.

A former senior Macao official was accused in court yesterday of taking USD 100m in kickbacks related to the recent boom in casino construction. Ao Man-long, former secretary for transport and public works, is the territory's highest-ranking official ever to be charged with graft. He faces 76 charges of taking bribes, money-laundering and abuse of power, which allegedly resulted in him and his wife earning 57 times the income their jobs should have netted them over a seven-year period.

Macau (Reuters) - Macau's biggest corruption trial opened on Monday with the court hearing charges that a former top official had taken millions of dollars in kickbacks to speed up construction of the gaming haven's multi-billion-dollar casinos. Former secretary for transport and public works Ao Man-long faces 76 counts of corruption, including accepting bribes, laundering money and abuse of power, shining a spotlight on the crime feeding off Macau's boom but also fanning hopes for stronger supervision.

Hong Kong (Reuters) - The biggest public corruption trial in Macau's history opens on Monday, putting the spotlight on the criminality feeding off the gambling mecca's rapid growth, and fanning hopes for a new era of improved governance. Macau's former secretary for transport and public works, Ao Man-long, faces 76 counts of corruption including alleged bribe-taking, money laundering and abuse of power. Ao, considered a political ally of Macau's leader Edmund Ho, is the most senior Macau official to be tried since the former Portuguese enclave returned to Chinese rule in 1999.