Saturday, January 27, 2024

Boten - a new City for 300000 People in Laos or just a new Hub for Crime?

"Will Laos' economic zones boost growth or bring in criminals?" An article by Nikkei Asia just has asked this question. The answer is open for Boten, the city at the last station, before the new Lao-China-Railway crosses the frontier between Laos and China. The new railway line from Kunming in China to Vientiane in Laos has opened a new trade route in Southeast Asia. Boten City has become a more important logistic hub.



Investors are seeking to reinvent the town of a few thousand people as a cross-border commerce hub. Experts, however, say the project is built on shaky economic foundations and therefore a possible subject for criminal activities. "The town has huge potential even without a casino," Siphone Kongchampa, the head of the Boten Special Economic Zone (Chinese: 磨丁经济特区) told Nikkei Asia. The SEZ is expected to expand to more than 16 square kilometres to host businesses from financial services to healthcare, Siphone said. The zone’s developer, the Yunnan-based Hai Cheng Group 云南海诚,a real estate company, says it plans to invest $10 billion to turn Boten into a city of 300,000 people. "That vision is a long way off, with the town’s main hub today consisting of about three square kilometers of Chinese restaurants, gambling halls, hotels and tower blocks", writes Nikkei Asia.


And there are doubts, expressed by Jason Tower, an expert on transnational crime and security issues in Southeast Asia at the United States Institute of Peace. He told Nikkei Asia: "Given the economic changes post-pandemic, given the slowdown in the Chinese economy, I don’t see how Boten is going to be successful unless it starts veering towards illicit businesses." The government of Laos has so far not controlled what occurs inside some of its SEZs, therefore concern is growing, that transnational crimes like money laundering, drug trafficking and online scams are facilitated.



"The center of Boten has an eerie feel to it. Everything in this border city in northern Laos looks huge: High-rise offices tower over wide, straight highways; vast hotels sit next to expansive duty-free stores. But all of these buildings sit in near total silence", wrote Sixth Tone in September 2023. "The only signs of life come after dark, when the karaoke bars and nightclubs open, and the crooning of middle-aged Chinese men fills the air."

Zhou Kun, chairman of Yunnan Haicheng, was appointed chairman of the Laos Boten Special Economic Zone Management Committee. He tries to develop clusters of commercial finance, logistics and processing, education and medical care and cultural tourism in Boten. But until now only in the the commercial and financial district new buildings have been constructed.





Jing Land Hotel in Botem:






Read more:

Boten: A Ghost Town waits to be waked up by China-Laos-Railway


See more pictures on Instagram:
ເຂດພັດທະນາເສດຖະກິດສະເພາະ ບໍ່ເຕ່ນແດນງາມ (Boten Special Economic Zone)
Boten Border Crossing
Borten SEZ ເຂດເສດຖະກິດພິເສດບໍ່ເຕ່ນແດນງາມ ລາວ

See aerial view of Boten on X.




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Inside Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone: A Chinese Zone in Laos, where Americans are not allowed in

Along the Mekong in Laos, on the border with Thailand, Myanmar and China, lies the "Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone" (Chinese: 金三角经济特区; Lao: ເຂດເສດຖະກິດພິເສດສາມຫຼ່ຽມຄຳ). If you spend just a few minutes there, you'll quickly realize that it's an area that Laos does not control. Who does? The zone has an area of about 3,000 hectares and was created in 2007 by the Lao government together with the Chinese-owned Hong Kong-registered company Kings Romans Group with the hope of generating economic development. A casino and hotels are the main attractions. But the zone has gained a reputation of being a Chinese city rife with illegal activities such as drug, human and animal trafficking, as you can read on Wikipedia. In January 2018, the United States Treasury Department sanctioned Kings Romans, its owner, Zhao Wei, and the "Zhao Wei Transnational Crime Organization," alleging the casino was used to launder money and traffic drugs, among other serious crimes. That's why holders of American passports are not allowed in, as this video docoumentations shows:




Another documentary bei International Crisis Group about the Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone: Inside South East Asia’s Criminal Empire.



Read more:
Will the Chinese Scam Networks relocate their Operations from Myanmar to Laos?


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Location: Tonpheung, Laos

Saturday, January 20, 2024

Will the Chinese Scam Networks relocate their Operations from Myanmar to Laos?

Kings Romans Casino in the Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone along Mekong river in Laos

Fears are rising over Myanmar-based scam groups relocating to Laos due to crackdown in Myanmar, pushed by China, reports rfa.org. In recent months China has intensified a crackdown on online scams operated by criminal syndicates in forced labour camps in border areas of military-ruled Myanmar. “There have been growing concerns that many of these scam groups might opt to relocate their operations to Laos, especially to its Golden Triangle area,” a source who wished to remain anonymous for security reasons told Radio Free Asia. South Korea therefore has decided to impose a travel ban for the Lao Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone (SEZ) from Feb. 1.

In December, the Lao authorities deported 462 Chinese nationals for offenses including human trafficking from the Golden Triangle SEZ according to rfa.org. in mid-September 164 Chinese nationals, including 46 arrested in the Bokeo Special Economic Zone were sent back to China. The Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone (SEZ) was established in 2007 in the northern province of Bokeo on a 3,000-hectare concession along the Mekong River. it has also earned a reputation as a haven for criminal activities, including prostitution and drug trafficking, reports rfa.org. Impoverished young people from Laos and neighboring countries have told Radio Free Asia they were lured to the area with the promise of a lucrative job but were then held against their will in casinos by trafficking rings that exploit them under threat of violence.

Lao authorities currently do not have the right to enter special economic zones to conduct investigations, notes rfa.org.

The skyline of Golden Triangle
By <a href="//commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:SaiLp&amp;action=edit&amp;redlink=1" class="new" title="User:SaiLp (page does not exist)">SaiLp</a> - <span class="int-own-work" lang="en">Own work</span>, CC BY-SA 4.0, Link

The skyline of the Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone on Mekong river

To the criminal networks, the casinos in Laos, Myanmar and Cambodia are the new banks, allowing them to launder money on a vast scale away from scrutiny and with little likelihood of law enforcement catching up with them, according to a report released in January by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), writes South China Morning Post. The government of China has painted an alarming picture of a Mekong region studded with casinos that are a crucial cog in the money-laundering machines engineered by gangsters in Taiwan and Macau, including the infamous 14K Triad and Taiwan’s Heavenly Way Alliance.

Zhao Wei (赵伟) is the owner of the Dok Ngiew Kham Group and co-owner of Hong Kong SAR-listed Kings Romans International (HK) which operates the Kings Romans casino in Laos. He is also the chairman of the Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone (GTSEZ). In the UNODC-report you can read: "Zhao Wei’s network of criminal connections in Asia has been solidified through his close association as a purported member of the 14K triad. In January 2018, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned Kings Romans and Zhao Wei, declaring his network a ‘transnational criminal organization’ and imposing sanctions on him and three associates as well as three of his companies based in Lao PDR, Thailand, and Hong Kong SAR. In addition to drug trafficking, the U.S. Treasury also alleges that Zhao’s network engages in human trafficking, wildlife trafficking, money laundering, and bribery, much of which is facilitated through Kings Romans." in December 2023, authorities in China and Lao PDR executed a joint operation targeting confirmed cyberfraud operations, raiding seven business offices and arresting 462 suspects in the Golden Triangle SEZ. Zhao Wei has denied the allegations that illegal activities took place in the zone.

But by a visit in 2023 the International Crisis Group identified four guarded high-rise buildings with barred windows and high fences wrapped in razor wire. "Locals told Crisis Group that people were locked inside and forced to work as online scammers", you can read in "Stepping into South East Asia’s Most Conspicuous Criminal Enclave".

Zhao Wei (red dress) in a picture from November 2019


According to Prof. Dr. Pinkaew Laungaramsri from the Faculty of Social Sciences at Chiang Mai University Zhao Wei has also invested in KK Park in Myanmar, a hub for scam operations and other crimes near the border of Mae Sot district in Thailand. She told https://transbordernews.in.th/: “One of the KK buildings, the KK4, as far as we know, has been made possible by the joint-investment with Kings Romans. Basically, Zhao Wei has purchased and invested in the project. Why did he buy the building? Obviously, because it is a hub of all the call-center gangsters and the connection is there.” The Professor said also: "At present, people lured to work with the call-center gangsters have been sold off to the Golden Triangle gangs and ended up in the area opposite to Mae Sot District. They are initially shipped through a boat ride to Tachileik and then transported on to Mae Sot District."


Read also:
Macao on the Mekong: How Chinese money flows into the Golden Triangle (31.1.2018)

Report "Casinos, Money Laundering, Underground Banking, and Transnational Organized Crime in East and Southeast Asia: A Hidden and Accelerating Threat" by UNODC
Transnational Crime and Geopolitical Contestation along the Mekong. Report by International Crisis Group.


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Location: Tonpheung, Laos
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