Renowned Online Scam Hub Associated with Chinese Criminal Syndicate Stormed

The Burmese junta announces it has taken control of among the most infamous scam facilities on the border with Thai territory, as it regains key area surrendered in the ongoing domestic strife.

KK Park, south of the frontier settlement of Myawaddy, has been synonymous with digital deception, cash cleaning and people smuggling for the past five years.

Numerous individuals were lured to the compound with promises of well-paid employment, and then forced to operate elaborate scams, extracting billions of currency from victims throughout the world.

The armed forces, long stained by its associations to the fraud operations, now declares it has seized the facility as it extends control around Myawaddy, the key trade link to Thailand.

In the past few weeks, the junta has pushed back insurgents in several regions of Myanmar, aiming to maximise the number of territories where it can organize a planned poll, commencing in December.

It currently doesn't control extensive areas of the state, which has been torn apart by conflict since a military coup in February 2021.

The election has been disregarded as a sham by anti-junta elements who have pledged to prevent it in territories they occupy.

KK Park started with a rental contract in the beginning of 2020 to construct an commercial zone between the KNU (KNU), the armed ethnic group which dominates much of this territory, and a obscure Hong Kong listed corporation, Huanya International.

Researchers believe there are connections between Huanya and a influential China-based mafia individual Wan Kuok Koi, more commonly called Broken Tooth, who has later invested in other fraud centers on the boundary.

The complex grew swiftly, and is easily visible from the Thai side of the boundary.

Those who managed to get away from it recount a violent environment enforced on the thousands, several from Africa-based countries, who were detained there, compelled to labor long hours, with abuse and beatings inflicted on those who were unable to achieve objectives.

A statement by the regime's official media said its personnel had "cleared" KK Park, liberating in excess of 2,000 employees there and seizing 30 of Elon Musk's Starlink internet equipment – commonly used by scam facilities on the Thai-Myanmar frontier for internet functions.

The declaration blamed what it called the "terrorist" ethnic organization and civilian resistance groups, which have been combating the junta since the takeover, for unlawfully holding the area.

The junta's claim to have dismantled this infamous scam centre is almost certainly aimed at its main supporter, China.

Beijing has been urging the military and the Thai administration to take additional measures to terminate the illegal activities operated by China-based networks on their border.

Earlier this year many of Chinese employees were extracted of fraud facilities and transported on special flights back to China, after Thai authorities cut access to electricity and energy resources.

But KK Park is merely one of at least 30 comparable facilities located on the boundary.

The majority of these are under the protection of Karen paramilitary forces aligned to the junta, and many are presently functioning, with tens of thousands operating scams inside them.

In actuality, the assistance of these armed units has been essential in helping the junta push back the KNU and other resistance factions from territory they captured over the recent two-year period.

The military now controls almost all of the road joining Myawaddy to the remainder of Myanmar, a objective the regime determined before it conducts the opening round of the vote in December.

It has seized Lay Kay Kaw, a new town established for the KNU with Japan-based investment in 2015, a era when there had been expectations for enduring peace in the Karen region following a nationwide truce.

That forms a more substantial setback to the KNU than the capture of KK Park, from which it obtained some revenue, but where the majority of the economic benefits were directed to military-aligned armed groups.

A well-placed source has suggested that fraud operations is ongoing in KK Park, and that it is probable the junta took control of only part of the sprawling facility.

The contact also thinks Beijing is supplying the Burmese military lists of Chinese people it seeks taken from the deception facilities, and returned back to stand trial in China, which may clarify why KK Park was raided.