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The Myanmar junta’s highly publicised crackdown on cyberfraud hubs near its borders is less a law enforcement statement than a calculated performance, analysts say, aimed at placating China and shoring up credibility ahead of an election widely seen as illegitimate.
Observers said the operation reflected the military’s need to project control in the face of domestic insurgency and foreign pressure, particularly from Beijing, whose citizens have been both victims and conscripts in the sprawling scam compounds operating from Myanmar’s lawless border zones.
Myanmar’s military said on Sunday that it arrested nearly 1,600 foreign nationals in five days in a crackdown on a notorious internet scam hub on the Thai border.
State media The Global New Light of Myanmar reported that “1,590 foreign nationals who entered Myanmar illegally were arrested” from last Tuesday to Saturday in raids on gambling and fraud hub Shwe Kokko.
Authorities also seized 2,893 computers, 21,750 mobile phones, 101 Starlink satellite receivers, 21 routers and a large number of equipment used in the online fraud and gambling activities.
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