One pirate CD sold for each Greek
Over 10 million pirated music CDs are sold in Greece every year, costing record companies an estimated 161.5 million euros in lost revenues, music industry officials told Kathimerini. According to the Association of Greek Recordings Producers (EEPI), most pirated compact discs on sale in Greece are made by African immigrants, who were quick to edge out the Bulgarian gangs that controlled the market in the mid 1990s, smuggling vast quantities of copied CDs over the border. «The highly organized Nigerian mafia controls the trade in pirated CDs in Greece,» EEPI General Manager Ioannis Stamboulis said. «[Pirates] prefer to use African vendors as, apart from the fact that they are leniently treated in court as, in many cases, their countries are ruled by dictatorial regimes, unemployment makes them easy victims.» Police say there are hundreds of illicit CD-pirating workshops all over the country, with gangs employing thousands of vendors, who, according to EEPI, can make up to 3,170 euros a month selling at under a third of the average music store price.
