The rescued Nepalis said they only found out about their involvement in online fraud about three months after they started working. Most of them are said to be skilled in the IT sector.
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Forty-seven Nepali workers who were held hostage and forced to work in an illegally operating online scamming center (telecom fraud and online gambling) in Shwe Kokko and KK Park in Myawaddy region of Myanmar have been rescued.
The Nepali Embassy in the bank, in coordination with the governments of Thailand and Myanmar, returned them to Nepal on Wednesday. They are being repatriated to Nepal via Nepal Airlines flight No. RA 402.
Among the rescued people, there are 47 people from 26 different districts, of which 45 are men and 2 are women. Of these, 5 are from Jhapa, 3 from Sindhupalchowk, 3 from Udayapur, 3 from Rupandehi, 3 from Gorkha, 3 from Dhading, 2 from Dang, 2 from Mahottari, 2 from Morang, 2 from Nawalparasi, 2 from Nuwakot, 2 from Syangja, 2 from Tanahun and one each from Chitwan, Dailekh, Kaski, Kathmandu, Kavrepalanchok, Palpa, Ramechhap, Rautahat, Salyan, Sarlahi, Sindhuli, Taplejung and Tehrathum.
In terms of age group, there is one 17-year-old, 26 people in the age group of 20 to 25 years, 10 people in the age group of 26 to 30 years, 8 people in the age group of 31 to 35 years, one person in the age group of 40 years and one person in the age group of 41 years. The embassy has stated that they have been involved in the scamming centers for two to 18 months.
According to an embassy official, the Myanmar army raided and rescued the Nepali workers from those centers. The embassy took them into custody from the Mae Sot Immigration Office in Tak Province, Thailand on Tuesday and sent them to Nepal. The embassy team reached the Thailand-Myanmar border area to pick up the Nepalis.
According to the embassy, it is not yet clear how many Nepalis are still in the online scamming center. Earlier, on October 19, 14 Nepalis were brought from Myanmar to Bangkok and sent to Nepal. ‘Only after raids on illegal scamming centers are it revealed whether there are Nepalis there or not,’ said the embassy official. ‘Often, Nepalis have been rescued along with citizens of other countries during raids.’
More than 2,000 citizens from 28 countries have been brought back to Thailand from Myanmar since October 19 alone. In a statement issued by Myanmar’s Ministry of Information on Wednesday, it was reported that 123 foreign nationals from six countries were repatriated through the Myanmar-Thailand Friendship Bridge on Tuesday. All of them had entered Myanmar illegally.
According to Myanmar’s Ministry of Information, a joint team comprising security forces, administrative units and local authorities has been continuously raiding buildings used by groups involved in telecom fraud and online gambling in the Shwe Kok and K K Park areas.
The joint team has been conducting searches in Myawaddy and surrounding areas since December 8. In this process, 10 out of 121 buildings used for online gambling were found to be illegal and 708 computers were seized, officials said.
According to the government, work is underway to systematically seize and demolish materials and structures used in online fraud and gambling. The information states that 351 buildings out of 635 illegal structures in the KK Park have been demolished so far. The park was put into operation in 2020.
The Myanmar government has said that it has intensified its control campaign against telecom fraud and online gambling as national priority crimes. ‘To prevent such activities from resuming, action will continue in cooperation with not only internal security agencies but also neighboring countries,’ the information said.
The rescued Nepalis said that they only learned about their involvement in online fraud about three months after they started working. Most of them are said to be skilled in the IT sector.
The victims had arrived in Myanmar after applying for jobs advertised as specialists, digital marketing or customer service representatives. ‘We were legally brought in and taken to a different park.’ Upon reaching there, our passports were taken away and we were forced to work under the watchful eye of strict security personnel,’ one victim told Kantipur.
After receiving information that people from various countries, including Nepalis, were stranded at scamming centers in Cambodia-Thailand, Myanmar-Thailand borders and Laos, the Nepali Embassy in Bangkok has been issuing a continuous travel advisory since 23 Shrawan 2080. After that, the rescue of stranded Nepalis as victims of human trafficking has started in coordination with the Thai government. Of the rescued people, 68 have been rescued in the fiscal year 2080/81, 156 in the fiscal year 2081/82 and 140 have been rescued so far in the current fiscal year.
