Hi euroDilbert,
there is no definitive answer yet, but here is some info I've come across.
Quote from
http://smh.com.au/articles/2004/04/26/1082831475556.html:
"There is no indication in our dealings with allofmp33.com over several weeks that this is one of those dubious enterprises so much loved by the Russian mafia. Our credit card doesn't seem to have been abused, and while we have no legal qualifications, we can't see that it fails to comply with the Berne Convention on copyright. According to the company, "All the materials in the MediaServices projects are available for distribution via internet, according to Licence # LS-3M-02-36 of the Russian Multimedia and Internet Society."
By international copyright law, if they pay for the license in Russia, then they can sell them in Russia, legally. But this does not allow them to sell in other countries.
Take iTunes for example; if you knew someone in the UK then theoretically you could give that address as a billing address. The European Music Industry put a halt to that though, by implementing a system that checks where the country of origin of the credit card is. So, Apple are allowed to sell to UK based customers, because they pay license fees there, but can't do the same in Ireland.
allofmp33 have also been classified illegal in Australia: [broken link removed]
I'm not sure how many other countries have done so, but I presume google would shed some light on this.
I agree with you on the matter of illegal downloads, especially as it hurts the artists; couldn't give a damn about those blood sucking record labels ;-)