Myanmar’s junta is sheltering cyber scam bosses who are wanted in China for operating online crime empires in Laukkai, the capital of Kokang, on the Chinese border, according to the Brotherhood Alliance.
In early December, the Chinese authorities issued arrest warrants for Bai Suocheng, the founder of Kokang’s military-allied Border Guard Force, and nine other scam bosses.
Eradicating Kokang’s online scams was one of the aims of the Brotherhood Alliance’s Operation 1027, which was launched on October 27 and has seized most of northern Shan State, including nearly 20 towns.
The alliance said on Sunday that it had handed more than 3,000 cyber scam suspects to the Chinese authorities during the three months since the operation was launched.
The junta sent around 40,000 cyber scam suspects had been sent to China but not those who faced Chinese warrants, the alliance said.
Regime transport helicopters reportedly evacuated scam bosses from Laukkai in early November.
On Friday the Khit Thit media group quoted junta informants saying the bosses are hiding at junta airbases and other military strongholds in Namhsan Township, northern Shan State.
Following the report the junta said it seized 1,038 Chinese citizens in Namhsan and accused the media of spreading fake news, making people mistrust the military.
Peng Deren, leader of the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, which is part of the Brotherhood Alliance, said in early January that four families affiliated with the junta ran numerous online scams with around 100,000 staff in Laukkai before the city fell.
Peng said the military and the four families had also been engaged in industrial-scale drug production in Kokang since 2009, turning it into a hub for cyber and drug crime.
An analyst said the regime might be hiding the key suspects to prevent its involvement in the online scam syndicates from being exposed.
