Apprehended suspects are lined up on the ground following a massive raid on a scam compound in Bavet city, southeastern Cambodia. Photo: Handout
PHNOM PENH: Cambodia has carried out a massive raid on scammer gangs, detaining more than 2,000 people amid pressure from China to crack down on its online fraud industry.
Nearly 1,800 Chinese nationals were among those held, according to the Cambodian interior ministry.
A ministry statement said that Cambodian police had conducted a large-scale enforcement operation on Saturday (Jan 31) morning at an online fraud compound in Bavet, the largest city in the southeastern province of Svay Rieng, which borders Vietnam.
A total of 2,044 foreigners were detained, of whom 1,792 were from mainland China, five from Taiwan, and 177 from Vietnam.
A further 179 were Myanmar nationals, the ministry said, with the rest hailing from neighbouring Southeast and South Asian countries.
The statement did not say if Cambodia intended to extradite the foreign suspects to their home countries.
However, Chinese nationals are expected to be handed over to Beijing as in the case of alleged cybercrime boss Chen Zhi, founder and chairman of Prince Holding Group, who was sent back in early January.
Cambodian police round up suspects inside the Bavet compound, which consisted of 22 buildings and operated under the guise of a casino. - Photo: Handout
Chen is accused of various illegal activities, including opening a casino, fraud, illegal operations, and concealing criminal proceeds.
The Bavet raid was “the largest operation” since Cambodia recently launched its nationwide crackdown on online fraud, the Cambodia China Times reported on Saturday night.
“This truly reflects that the Cambodian government will never loosen its crackdowns on online scam criminals,” Ministry of Interior spokesman Touch Sokhak said on Sunday.
Cambodia is “not a safe haven, but a hell for criminals,” he noted.
The compound in Bavet consisted of 22 buildings and operated under the guise of a casino. It had reportedly long been used for illegal activities, including telecoms and online fraud.
Simultaneous actions targeting these illegal activities were also carried out in multiple other regions, including Sihanoukville province, located about 250 km (155 miles) southwest of the capital Phnom Penh.
The high-pressure crackdown had caused several scam sites to voluntarily shut down, with those involved leaving the area, according to the Cambodia China Times.
Cambodian police round up suspects inside the Bavet compound, which consisted of 22 buildings and operated under the guise of a casino. Photo: Handout
The Cambodian government has intensified its crackdown on fraud-related crimes since last month, a move driven in part by pressure from China
China has in recent years stepped up its own crackdown on telecoms and online fraud, initially targeting the scam networks operating in northern Myanmar. Once those local syndicates were largely dismantled or relocated, the focus shifted to Cambodia and its flourishing scam centres.
Criminal acts of online fraud, illegal detention, and associated transnational crimes “posed a serious obstacle” to deepening cooperation between the two countries, Wang Wenbin, the Chinese ambassador to Cambodia, said during meetings with Cambodian Foreign Minister Prak Sokhonn and Interior Minister Sar Sokha last month.
“Recent incidents involving Chinese nationals going missing or disappearing in Cambodia have drawn China’s close attention,” a Chinese foreign ministry statement quoted Wang as saying.
“The frequent occurrence of such cases runs counter to the traditional friendship between China and Cambodia.”
Several high-level Cambodian officials, including Prak Sokhonn and Deputy Prime Minister Sun Chanthol, have pledged to keep up the fight against the fraud industry.
“Online fraud has damaged Cambodia’s national reputation and image, and we will spare no effort to eradicate this problem,” Sun Chanthol said last month.
According to a report last week from Cambodia’s Ad-Hoc Committee to Combat Online Scams, a total of 5,106 suspects from 23 countries were arrested for online scams in Cambodia over the last seven months.
Of these, 4,534 were deported to their home countries. - South China Morning Post
