SHWE KOKKO (TIP): Battered and bruised Chinese workers from online scam centres in Myanmar faced an anxious wait to return home, as Beijing and Thailand finalised plans on Feb 19 for their repatriation. Scam compounds have flourished in Myanmar’s lawless borderlands, staffed by foreigners, many of whom say they were trafficked and forced to work swindling people around the world. Many of those involved are Chinese, though people from numerous countries are thought to have been caught up in an industry analysts say is worth billions of dollars a year.
The Karen Border Guard Force (BGF), a militia allied with the Myanmar junta, has said it is preparing to deport 10,000 people linked to the compounds in areas it controls on the border with Thailand.
In a shabby, strip-lit room in a building in Shwe Kokko — a Myanmar border town known as a hub for scam centres — dozens of workers, mostly Chinese, sprawled on plastic sheeting, looking exhausted as they awaited their deportation.
An AFP stringer was among a group of journalists taken by the BGF on Tuesday to meet some of the workers.
Some bore shocking bruises — one man’s bottom was completely covered in livid purple, while several showed painful lesions on their lower legs and other had burn injuries.
“I really want to go home,” said one Chinese man, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “I wanted to go home as soon as I arrived. I really miss my parents and family.” “I am very nervous,” he told AFP.
(AFP)