Myanmar scam ties to SE Asia kingpins

A new report outlines a transnational network of businesses built by the Myawaddy Border Guard Force in Myanmar that protects and profits from Chinese criminal syndicates operating online scam centres.

Amanda HodgeSoutheast Asia correspondent

@hodgeamanda

3 min read

9:30AMMay 22, 2024

The new Chinese-built city known as Shwe KokKo, also called Yatai City, sits on the eastern edge of Myanmar’s Kayin State near the Thai border. Picture: Luke Duggleby / Redux

An Australian casino manager, a former Malaysian minister, her former diplomat husband, Thai police, banks, and an ASX-listed company have all been linked to one of Southeast Asia’s biggest and most-violent cyber scam regions in a new report that calls for regional authorities to hold citizens accountable for involvement in transnational crime.

The report by Justice for Myanmar, a data-driven activist group, outlines a transnational network of businesses built by the junta-aligned Border Guard Force militia in Myawaddy, Karen state, that protects and profits from Chinese criminal syndicates operating from its region.

It details links between some of the most infamous Chinese kingpins operating criminal enterprises inside Myawaddy – including Chinese Triad leader Wan Kuok-koi (or Broken Tooth) and She Zhijiang, now in Thai custody – and politically connected figures in the region.

The Karen state capital on Thailand’s western border has long been a hotbed of organised crime but an explosion of casinos in the area, many of which switched to online gaming during the pandemic, has led to a huge escalation in cyber scamming powered by thousands of trafficked workers subjected to debt bondage and violence, say Interpol and the UN.

Among Myawaddy’s most notorious crime parks is Shwe Kokko, a collaboration between She Zhijiang and two Malaysian investors that was once billed as a “New Macau” but has since earned notoriety for scam compounds, illegal online gaming and child prostitution.

Thailand this month pulled internet and phone services to Shwe Kokko amid greater scrutiny of criminal activity inside the city, from which the Myawaddy BGF is said to earn as much as $US192m a year in kickbacks.

BGF commander Sam Myint (or Saw Chit Thu) was sanctioned by the British government in December along with BGF colonel Saw Min Min Oo, who is a director of the company developing Shwe Kokko, and She Zhijiang.

None of those men has been sanctioned by the Australian government.

“Authorities in the region must do far more to investigate the involvement of their citizens, residents and companies in the transnational and international crimes committed in Myanmar,” said JFM spokesperson Yadanar Maung, who urged Australia to sanction known cyber scam criminal kingpins.

Transparency International also called on the government to act, saying Myawaddy’s crime networks were not only scamming vulnerable Australians but enriching Myanmar’s generals who “protect and profit” from such crimes.

“With the alleged involvement of an Australian gaming contractor and an ASX-listed company, the Australian government should not only sanction the Myanmar military but also the Karen BGF and the individuals behind this web of criminality,” Transparency International Australia director Clancy Moore said.

The JFM report reveals an Australian gaming manager, Brian Colwell, ran Shwe Kokko’s main Golden Winner casino from 2018 to 2020, and again from June to December 2022.

Mr Colwell confirmed to The Australian that he managed live table gambling in the casino for Destiny Gaming, a Manila-based gaming contractor, but said he had no involvement in illicit online gaming or other illegal activities. “There was no online gaming on the property. Obviously I didn’t go into any of these compounds that were close by in the region that were very highly secured,” he said.

“I read about what was happening in Shwe Kokko and other areas in the vicinity of Myawaddy but I never directly witnessed any abuse or anything like that. I was managing a legitimate live-table casino that had nothing to do with these atrocities.”

ASX-listed Frontier Digital Ventures was also named in the report through its majority shareholding in a Myanmar real estate firm that launched and marketed the Karen BGF’s Myawaddy New City development.

Frontier Digital Ventures chief executive Shaun di Gregorio said its iMyanmarHouse online property platform had done “no active promotion” for the development since 2023 and that its only dealings were with developer Steel Stone.

“There’s certainly no direct relationship with the BGF,” Mr di Gregorio said.

Others highlighted by JFM include Mashitah Ibrahim, a deputy minister in charge of Islamic Affairs in jailed former Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak’s office, who with her former diplomat husband attended the opening of the Broken Tooth-owned Dongmei Park in 2020, the year the Chinese gangster was sanctioned by the US.

Dongmei (or Saixigang) Park is known to harbour multiple cyber scam companies and illegal online gaming activities manned by a labour force of largely trafficked workers.

It is run by the Dongmei group, an alias (according to the US government) for Broken Tooth’s Hong Kong-registered Dongmei Investment Group that lists Dr Ibrahim’s husband, Abdul Shakor bin Abu Bakar, as a director.

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said the government did not speculate on potential sanctions measures.

“Human rights sanctions are one of a suite of possible foreign policy levers the Australian government may consider in responding to situations of concern,” DFAT said.

“Australia has a robust legal framework to deal with criminal offences relating to modern slavery and human trafficking.”

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Amanda HodgeSouth East Asia Correspondent

Amanda Hodge is The Australian’s South East Asia correspondent, based in Jakarta. She has lived and worked in Asia since 2009, covering social and political upheaval from Afghanistan to East Timor. She has won a Walkley Award, Lowy Institute media award and UN Peace award.

@hodgeamanda

Myanmar scam ties to SE Asia kingpins

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