The junta isn’t cracking down on scam compounds—it’s protecting them

The network of scam compounds along Myanmar’s border with Thailand has evolved into one of Southeast Asia’s most pressing transnational security concerns. What started as a handful of illicit sites in Karen State’s Myawaddy Township has grown into a widespread criminal economy: driving human trafficking, corruption, money laundering and increasingly sophisticated cyber-fraud that reaches far beyond the region. These scam syndicates have not merely survived the upheavals of Myanmar’s post-coup landscape; they have thrived. And yet their success is not a mystery.They operate under the explicit authorisation of the Myanmar junta and the protection of its allied Karen Border Guard Force (BGF) units and increasingly the Democratic Karen Benevolent Army (DKBA), a splinter armed faction also known to support the military.This junta–criminal partnership is at the core of the problem, and it explains why the recent publicised “crackdowns”, stage-managed by the junta, look less like genuine law-enforcement raids and more like an orchestrated political stunt to generate photo opportunities. The regime’s recent operation at KK Park, one of the most notorious and deadly enclaves in Myawaddy, sheds light on how the event appears to have been managed for public impact. In the days preceding the raid, local Karen BGF forces quietly evacuated senior operators and foreign crime leaders from the area.When troops finally moved in, they demolished only a limited number of smaller structures, a symbolic action within a vast complex that contains numerous scam centres, trafficking hubs, detention rooms and underground casinos.Eyewitnesses and local communities were quick to recognise the junta’s sleight-of-hand: erasing evidence, sanitising crime scenes, and staging a performance tailored for international consumption. Satellite imagery clearly shows the raid had little real impact. And now the junta is now repeating the same strategy in Shwe Kokko, a glittering city largely built on organized crime, corruption and scams in Myawaddy Township.These limited demolitions do little to indicate a meaningful attempt to disrupt the networks that have operated with official tolerance—and, by many accounts, generated revenue for the military. Rather than a comprehensive crackdown, the recent raids appear aimed at minimising disruption to business while signaling outward cooperation to international audiences. This is the real story behind the junta’s so-called crackdowns: preserve the criminal economy, sacrifice expendable low-level operatives, and manage global scrutiny without altering the underlying architecture of profit and patronage. The junta’s recent participation in the China-initiated six-country dialogues in Kunming has been widely cited as evidence of regional cooperation. In reality, it is little more than a diplomatic shield. While attending these meetings, the junta has refused to engage with theU.S.-led Scam Center Strike Force, a multilateral initiative designed to disrupt transnational criminal networks and rescue trafficking victims trapped in compounds like KK Park. The contrast is striking.Beijing’s dialogue platform gives the junta symbolic legitimacy without demanding transparency or verifiable action. The U.S.-led initiative, in contrast, would require accountability, access, and genuine enforcement—none of which the junta is willing to allow. Selective engagement is not an accident; it is the military junta’s strategy for survival. These criminal hubs generate billions of dollars annually, enriching the junta’s generals, their business allies, and its allied BGF command structure. Asking the junta to dismantle these scam operations is asking it to destroy one of its own financial lifelines. In stark contrast, the anti-junta Karen National Union (KNU) has publicly welcomed the U.S. initiative and its Scam Center Strike Force, and has expressed its willingness to cooperate fully with multilateral efforts to shut down these international organised crime syndicates.The KNU has consistently emphasised that the scam-centre economy is a direct threat to human dignity, regional security, and the rule of law. For communities living along the Thai-Myanmar border, scam hubs are not abstract political concerns—they are sources of human trafficking, forced labor, criminal predation, and violence. This openness from ethnic governing authorities should not be overlooked. It demonstrates that credible partners exist inside Myanmar who are willing to participate in real accountability mechanisms, if the international community is willing to engage with them. Thailand has begun tightening its response, increasing checkpoints around Mae Sot amid concerns over trafficking, migration and cyber-fraud spilling across the border. But enforcement alone is unlikely to stem the problem while the criminal economy in Myanmar remains intact. A political split is emerging along the border. International actors and local groups like the KNU are pushing for transparency and victim protection, while the junta and its allied networks continue to profit from criminal revenue and work to obscure evidence and block cooperation. The question now is, are regional governments and international partners prepared to confront the real drivers and protectors of the scam-center economy? Diplomatic statements and selective raids will not dismantle a criminal infrastructure embedded in state institutions. What is needed is coordinated political pressure, targeted sanctions, genuine cooperation with local authorities who are willing to act, and a multilateral accountability system insulated from the junta’s manipulation.The scale of harm these scam compounds inflict on victims globally is immense: billions siphoned away, psychological trauma, and growing mistrust in financial institutions. Only in recent years have governments begun to confront Myanmar’s scam networks and the militias that sustain them. The next step is to move beyond recognition of the problem to taking decisive and meaningful action. The stakes, for the victims trapped inside these compounds, for the communities living along the border, and for regional security as a whole—could not be higher. Saw Kapi is the founding director of the Salween Institute, a long-time Myanmar analyst, and a former educator involved in the pro-democracy movement after 1988.

The junta isn’t cracking down on scam compounds—it’s protecting them

Public demolitions and selective diplomacy obscure a criminal economy from which the military continues to profit

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