Inside the "Shwe Padauk Myaing" scam hub: torture and human trafficking uncovered in Myawaddy

-
Image
Major General Saw Chit-thu (left), Major General Saw Tin Win (middle) and Colonel Saw Htoo Eh-mu (right) are seen at the ceremony to officially change the name of the BGF to the KNA on January 1. A Chinese national who escaped from the Yulong Bay (aka Shwe Pi Tauk Myaing) online money laundering operation near Thae Pon village in Myawaddy township, owned by Colonel Saw Htoo Eh-mu, the son of Karen National Army (KNA) leader Major General Saw Chit-thu. Many foreigners are being tortured and forced to work in the Yulong Bay (aka Shwe Pi Tauk Myaing) online money laundering operation near Thae Pon village in Myawaddy township, according to a Chinese national who escaped from the operation. Mizzima Special Correspondent Han Htoo Zaw (Mizzima)  A Chinese survivor who recently escaped the Yulong Bay (also known as Shwe Padauk Myaing) online scam compound near Thae Pone village, Myawaddy Township, has exposed a brutal system of daily torture, extortion, and forced labour involving over ...
Post a Comment

Myanmar junta claims capture of giant jungle meth labs in Shan State

-

AFP

Myanmar’s junta said Wednesday it had captured three record-sized jungle laboratories responsible for making a third of all the methamphetamine seized in the country last year.

Myanmar has long been a hive for illegal drug trade, but analysts say the civil war triggered by a 2021 military coup has increased production and trafficking.

A kaleidoscope of rebel factions control different swathes of Myanmar, and all sides are accused of using narcotics proceeds to fill their war chests and fund their administrations.

AFP journalists joined a military-organised press tour through the smouldering wreckage of two former labs south of the town of Hsipaw in northeastern Shan state.

They were the size of modest villages, with their own roads, living quarters and elaborate power and water infrastructure.

Gas masks and rubber gloves littered the floor, pipework production facilities still gurgled, and barrels stood full of what police officials said was crystal methamphetamine, ready to be ground and pressed into pills.

“This is the biggest seizure and destruction by an anti-drugs operation in our history,” junta spokesman Zaw Min Tun told reporters in the town of Pyin Oo Lwin.

Police said they believed the three affiliated facilities produced more than a third of the 37 tons of methampetamine seized in 2025, based on informant tip-offs and a comparison of the tea and coffee bags the traffickers used to conceal drugs.

A combined opposition offensive starting in late 2023 saw the military lose huge parts of Shan state to rebels.

However, China-brokered ceasefires have peeled off two of the most powerful rebel groups.

The Myanmar military said it discovered the meth labs when it took back lost ground from rebels as the fighting lulled.

AFP

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

World's longest internet shutdown ends in parts of Myanmar

-
Image
Rakhine people travel by motorcycle in Sittwe, Rakhine State, Western Myanmar, 02 February 2021. Photo: Nyunt Win/EPA By AFP The world's longest internet shutdown -- affecting more than a million people for 19 months in one of Myanmar's ethnic conflict zones -- has come to an end, according to a mobile operator based in the region. The internet in parts of Myanmar's troubled northern states of Rakhine and Chin was suspended in June 2019 following "emergency" orders issued by the telecoms department under Aung San Suu Kyi's civilian government. Following Monday's military coup, mobile operator Telenor Group confirmed it had reinstated full services in eight townships in Rakhine and Chin states on Wednesday. "Telenor Group and Telenor Myanmar have been advocating for the restoration of services and emphasised that freedom of expression through access to telecoms services should be maintained for humanitarian purposes," the company said in a stateme...
Read more

First ministerial meeting held

-
Image
Mizzima Myanmar held the first meeting among newly appointed ministers after a recent major cabinet reshuffle by the military in capital city of Nay Pyi Taw on Tuesday morning, according to a release from the Military True News Information Team Xinhua reported. The Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, acting President U Myint Swe and nine newly appointed union ministers were present at the meeting held at the Presidential Palace, the release said. Min Aung Hlaing unveiled plans to include reopening religious buildings and pagodas, resuming domestic travel and hotel businesses as well as industries in line with COVID-19 rules and regulations, and revitalizing the country's economy.
Read more

Indonesia detains British woman on terror suspect list

-
Image
File photo of Indonesian police personnel standing guard. (Photo: AFP) AFP Indonesia has detained a British woman named on a list of global terror suspects and plans to deport her for visa violations, authorities told AFP Tuesday. Tazneen Miriam Sailar -- a Manchester-born convert to Islam married to an Indonesian jihadist who was killed in Syria -- is not charged with terror offences. But she and her late husband are on an Indonesian police list of suspected extremists that includes several foreigners notorious in the West. Sailar, 47, and her 10-year-old Indonesia-born son, were being held in Jakarta after being picked up last year without documents allowing her to remain in the Southeast Asian nation, her lawyer Farid Ghozali said. "She was put (in detention) while awaiting her return, which will be facilitated by the British embassy," Indonesian immigration directorate spokesman Ahmad Nursaleh told AFP. The embassy declined to comment, and it was unclear when...
Read more