Irrawaddy-July 29
Myanmar’s military-dominated Parliament approved a law on Tuesday authorizing capital punishment for those who detain or violently coerce victims into working in online scam centers.
Myanmar lawmakers passed the Anti-Online Scam Bill at a joint session of Parliament in the capital Naypyitaw on Tuesday, parliament speaker Aung Lin Dwe said during a live television broadcast. Lower House MP Aye Chan told AFP the death sentence was included in the final version of the law. “There were not many significant changes to the proposed draft bill… the important parts of the bill remained the same,” Aye Chan said. A draft text published in May included sentences of 10 years to life in prison, as well as capital punishment, for “violence, torture, unlawful arrest and detention, or cruel treatment against another person for the purpose of forcing them to commit online scams.” For scam offences causing death, “the death penalty shall be imposed.” The draft bill also featured a maximum sentence of life in prison for those who run an online scam center or are convicted of cryptocurrency scams. Internet fraud factories have flourished in war-torn Myanmar, part of Southeast Asia’s thriving scam economy that targets web users worldwide with romance and cryptocurrency investment cons. The multibillion-dollar business attracts many willing employees, but repatriated foreigners have also reported being trafficked to sites in Myanmar and tortured by scam center operators. Under pressure from the U.S. and China, the Myanmar government of putschist-turned-president Min Aung Hlaing has pledged to crack down on the illicit industry.
But raids and arrests have resulted in scam outfits relocating elsewhere in the region rather than ceasing operations. The anti-scam law is the first legislation passed by Myanmar’s new government. Chinese-origin syndicates “constitute the major organizational force” behind the region’s cyberscam economy, running industrial-scale scam compounds in border areas and special economic zones in Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos, a report from the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) said this month. Read more at:
