Myanmar deports over 50,000 scam centre workers to China amid crackdown

Myanmar’s ruling junta has called on neighbouring countries to help combat the issue, which analysts say is worth billions of dollars

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Myanmar police hand over telecom and internet fraud suspects to Chinese police at Yangon International Airport in 2023. Photo: Chinese embassy in Myanmar/Xinhua

Published: 7:19pm, 21 Jan 2025Updated: 8:24am, 22 Jan 2025

Myanmar’s ruling junta said on Tuesday it had deported to China more than 50,000 people suspected of involvement in online scam operations since October 2023, as it made a rare call to neighbouring countries to intervene.

Scam compounds have mushroomed in Myanmar’s borderlands and are staffed by foreigners who are often trafficked and forced to work, swindling their compatriots in an industry analysts say is worth billions of dollars.

An editorial published in the state-run Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper on Tuesday detailed the extent of the criminal activities – including online scams and gambling – publicly for the first time.

It said the junta had caught and deported more than 55,000 foreigners involved in border scams to their home countries since October 2023, including 53,000 to China.

More than 1,200 fraud suspects were handed over from Myanmar authorities to the Chinese government in September 2023. Photo: Xinhua

The second-largest contingent – more than a thousand individuals – was from Vietnam, followed by Thailand with more than 600. The rest came from around 25 other countries, according to the Global New Light of Myanmar.

The article added those responsible were not Myanmar nationals or ordinary foreign civilians, but “fugitive offenders” who illegally entered Myanmar from neighbouring countries.