Scam centers in Myanmar: Eleven people from mafia family executed in China
In Southeast Asia, hundreds of thousands are forced to defraud people online or by phone. China is now cracking down on this – including with executions.
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In China, eleven people have been executed who were allegedly responsible for online fraud from scam centers in Myanmar and were sentenced to death in September. The state news agency Xinhua reported this, explaining that central figures from telephone fraud organizations were among them. The BBC adds that the executed individuals are said to come from one of several notorious mafia families who have turned the “impoverished provincial town” of Laukkai on the border with China into a “glittering center with casinos and red-light districts” with their criminal activities. In 2023, this collapsed when a militia took over the city and handed over the criminals.
Beijing cracks down on scam centers
In Myanmar, criminal organizations have established large-scale fraud operations in some areas, in which hundreds of thousands of people are forced to contact people worldwide via the internet and defraud them with various schemes. This happens in huge facilities where people are held and sometimes mistreated. This is facilitated by the civil war that has been ongoing for years. The ruling military is trying to suppress any resistance, but various rebel groups are fighting against the rulers across the country, sometimes extremely successfully, and have established their spheres of influence. According to the BBC, Beijing has supported militias that are taking action against the scam centers.
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According to the dpa news agency, the executed individuals in China were accused of having established their bases in the neighboring country since 2015. From there, they allegedly operated fraud and illegal gambling and had imprisoned their victims. In addition, 14 Chinese citizens were killed in violent incidents related to the activities. There is also talk of economic damage amounting to more than ten billion yuan (around 1.2 billion euros). The criminals were convicted in the eastern Chinese city of Wenzhou for, among other things, murder, intentional bodily harm, illegal deprivation of liberty, fraud, and operating gambling establishments, writes Xinhua. An appeal against this was rejected.
(mho)
