Myawaddy Town, actually harbors dangers, located in the Shwe Kokko area of Myawaddy, Kayin State, Myanmar. This border area, just a river away from Thailand, has long been notorious as the "Wall Street of telecom fraud."
The "manipulator" behind the scenes, the leader of the Border Guard Force (BGF) of Kayin, Saw Chit Thu, has recently claimed to reform the entire Shwe Kokko area. Surprisingly, he intends to transform this "hotbed of crime" into a legitimate economic center. Is this just a show, or is he genuinely planning for the future development of his governed area?
Within the barbed wire fences of its park, thousands of victims are forced into cyber fraud.
The rise of Saw Chit Thu is a microcosm of the chaotic border situation in Southeast Asia.
From an undercover agent of the Myanmar military to a warlord controlling a region, Saw Chit Thu has built a criminal empire with an annual output value of over 20 billion US dollars through controlling gambling, telecom fraud, and smuggling networks in Myawaddy.
Saw Chit Thu's Kayin Border Guard Force collects 30% of the land rent from the fraud parks, 700 million US dollars in protection fees annually, and directly participates in profit sharing. These "dark funds" are the core financial source for maintaining his nearly ten thousand armed forces. This is quite different from his previous claim of being just a "landlord." More ironically, the expansion of Saw Chit Thu's power is closely linked to the "silent approval" of the Myanmar government.
In 2010, he transformed the democratic Kayin Buddhist Army into a "legitimate" border force recognized by the military government, and then introduced Chinese capital to build a "New Tech City," which is actually a base for the entire telecom fraud industry.
After the 2024 coup in Myanmar, he broke with the military government to gain the trust of ethnic armed groups, while secretly allowing the military to bomb hostile positions, thereby consolidating control over the fraud parks. Relying on this survival "strategy" of playing both sides, he has always remained undefeated in the warlord melee.
"Reform" might be a self-rescue performance
Facing the joint crackdown by China, Thailand, and other countries, Saw Chit Thu's "transformation" plan appears very high-profile. He claims to have rescued over 7,000 victims of telecom fraud, plans to repatriate 20,000 people, and announces the construction of a 200-acre industrial zone in Shwe Kokko, introducing animal feed factories, food processing plants, and other legitimate industries, even emphasizing that "Chinese enterprises are the main investors."
On the surface, this seems like a dramatic transformation from a "crime godfather" to a "reform pioneer," but our own research into his actions reveals many flaws: Saw Chit Thu claims to have rescued thousands, but the number of people handed over by Thai and Myanmar officials is only in the hundreds. More mysteriously, the Kayin Border Guard Force recently admitted that most of those captured are low-level managers, with the main culprits still at large. This "catch the small, release the big" tactic is very similar to the strategy of the four major families in Northern Myanmar, who "transfer core assets and scapegoat peripheral gangs."
In early 2025, Saw Chit Thu convened a meeting of telecom fraud leaders, proposing "prohibitions on forced labor and the use of child labor" among other demands, but then transferred the telecom fraud operations to Cambodia and established a "Thai Plate" specifically targeting Thai citizens for fraud.
This is completely a "left hand strikes, right hand expands" two-faced approach, exposing the hypocrisy of his "compliance." Another important point is that Saw Chit Thu earns over 100 million US dollars annually from telecom fraud. If he truly transforms, his armed forces' maintenance will face the risk of financial disruption. Additionally, the entangled interests of Chinese gray investors, local Myanmar forces, and the military government make Saw Chit Thu's "one-cut" reform nearly impossible.
Saw Chit Thu's "whitewashing" plan seems ambitious but faces significant challenges.
Myawaddy is located in the "lawless" area of the Thai-Myanmar border, where the central government of Myanmar has long lacked control, and although Thailand has cut off electricity and internet and prepared arrest warrants several times, it struggles with cross-border law enforcement. Saw Chit Thu takes advantage of this "power vacuum" to navigate among multiple forces. The current telecom fraud park has already formed a transnational industry chain.
Saw Chit Thu cooperates with Hong Kong gangs and Cambodian casinos, dispersing victims and capital flows to multiple countries. Even if one location tightens its crackdown, the business can quickly shift. This "whack-a-mole" style of governance limits the effectiveness of actions by individual countries.
Saw Chit Thu previously packaged telecom fraud as a "online gambling company," claiming it was "legal in many countries" to confuse the public. However, in reality, telecom fraud is highly tied to human trafficking, money laundering, and other crimes, and the so-called "industrial zone" may become a tool for laundering illegal funds.
So, Saw Chit Thu's reform is essentially not credible at all
Saw Chit Thu's "reform" is fundamentally a crisis PR stunt.
The approaching threats of internet and power cutoffs and international arrest warrants force this warlord to "transform" to buy breathing space.
However, his past inconsistent stances and symbiotic relationship with criminal groups make any promises seem weak and ineffective.
To truly dismantle the telecom fraud empire, it is necessary to strike at the root of the criminal ecosystem:
1. Cut off the funding chain: The international community needs to collaborate in tracking illegal financial flows and freezing the overseas assets of Saw Chit Thu and his associated forces;
2. Pressure the Myanmar government: Although the military government is embroiled in civil war, it needs to be forced to cut off covert deals with local armed groups;
3. Protect the victims' channel: Improve the transnational repatriation mechanism to prevent "rescue" from becoming PR material for local armed groups.
The problem of telecom fraud is not only a cancer in Southeast Asia but also a test of global governance.
If Saw Chit Thu and others are allowed to continue their game of "committing crimes with one hand and reforming with the other," Myawaddy's barbed wire fences will only continue to stage new "bloody businesses."
