Cambodia hands over 119 Thais in cyber-scam crackdown
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Indonesians roped into online scams in in Myanmar arrive in Tangerang, Banten province, in Indonesia on Feb 28.
PHOTO: AFP
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BANGKOK – Cambodia said on March 1 it deported 119 Thais across the two countries’ shared border, the latest handover in a regional crackdown on illegal cyber-scam centres.
Cambodia’s immigration department said in a post on its Facebook page that the Thais – 61 men and 58 women – “snuck in to work and stayed illegally” in Thailand.
They were among 230 foreigners detained
The Thais were deported via the Poipet border checkpoint on March 1, it added.
Cyber-scam centres – which lure foreigners to work in scam hothouses swindling people with online romance and crypto investment cons – have proliferated across South-east Asia in recent years.
The Cambodian authorities launched high-profile raids on the illegal compounds in late 2022.
The March 1 handover came a day after Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra visited Sa Kaeo, the Thai town neighbouring Poipet, to “eliminate call centre gangs”, she said in a post on social media platform X.
Deputy Prime Minister Phumtham Wechayachai confirmed in a post on X that the 119 Thais had been returned from Cambodia.
Both the Thai and Cambodian authorities said the workers were paid to commit fraud online and worked voluntarily.
A frontier town known for its casinos, Poipet has become a hub for cyber-scam centres and online gambling operations.
The repatriations come as Thailand, Myanmar and Cambodia have ramped up efforts to curb a cyber-scam industry worth billions of dollars a year, with the United Nations estimating as many as 120,000 people may be working in Myanmar scam centres.
Many workers say they were lured or tricked into the scam centres by promises of high-paying jobs before they were effectively held hostage, their passports taken from them while they were forced to commit online fraud.
Jakarta said on March 1 a group of 84 Indonesians who worked in cyber-scam centres in Myanmar were repatriated
The Foreign Ministry said it repatriated an early group of 46 Indonesians in February, bringing the total repatriated since last month to 140.
Thousands of Indonesians have been enticed abroad in recent years to other South-east Asian countries for better-paying jobs, only to end up in the hands of transnational scam operators. AFP
