Chinese authorities have charged 16 Myanmar citizens with crimes including murder and telecoms fraud as part of a crackdown on cross-border cybercrime.
Criminal gangs are accused of luring hundreds of thousands of people to cross the border into Myanmar and then forcing them to take part in telecoms scams in the so-called Golden Triangle.
Myanmar authorities have handed over more than 31,000 telecoms fraud suspects to China since law enforcement officers from both countries started targeting cross-border gangs last September.
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Crime syndicates are believed to have made millions of US dollars a day from the scams, according to state news agency Xinhua.
Last year Chinese state broadcaster CCTV reported that the authorities believe that up to 100,000 people in one city alone – Myawaddy on the border between Myanmar and Thailand – were involved in telecoms fraud.
The latest charges, filed in the eastern province of Zhejiang, involve 39 people, 16 of whom are citizens of Myanmar. They are accused of offences that include murder, fraud, unlawful detention, organised gambling and prostitution, and drug trafficking
The suspects include members of the Ming family, an ethnically Chinese family accused of running a cross border crime syncdicate. The head of the family Ming Xuechang, died in an apparent suicide last November after being detained.
His son Ming Guoping (also known as Mg Myin Shaut Phyin), daughter Ming Julan (Myin Shut Lan) and granddaughter Ming Zhenzhen (Ma Thiri Maung) – who are all believed to be citizens of Myanmar – were handed over to the Chinese authorities in November last year.
Ming Guoping, 43, was a leader of the Kokang Border Guard Force, which operates under the command of the Myanmar military.
Xinhua said the 39 suspects are either members of the Ming family syndicate or its associated groups, entrenched themselves in Kokang, a region in Shan state on the border with the Chinese province of Yunnan.
The suspects are either Chinese citizens or ethnically Chinese Myanmar citizens and are accused of targeting Chinese-speaking victims.
“They have relied on armed forces to carry out large-scale telecoms and online fraud targeting Chinese citizens, among other crimes,” Xinhua reported.
A commentary by the news agency said the charges would “serve as a strong deterrent to overseas telecoms fraud criminals, demonstrating [China’s] strength and spirit of the rule of law.”
Prosecutors told Xinhua that Chinese authorities have jurisdiction over the case because crimes that took place outside China’s borders violated the personal rights of Chinese citizens.
It also alleged that some of the crimes had taken place inside China, including sex trafficking and organising gambling establishments.
The Chinese and Myanmar police worked together to investigate the case and hand over suspects, Xinhua added.
This case is not the first time that the Chinese judicial authorities have targeted cross-border crime. In one of the most notorious cases, the Golden Triangle drug lord Naw Kham and three associates were executed in 2013 for murdering 13 Chinese sailors on the Mekong between Thailand and Laos.
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This article originally appeared in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative voice reporting on China and Asia for more than a century. For more SCMP stories, please explore the SCMP app or visit the SCMP’s Facebook and Twitter pages. Copyright © 2024 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
Copyright (c) 2024. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
