As the Thai defense secretary visits the border, there are 39 Chinese among those who have been freed.
PUBLISHED: 6 Feb 2025 at 17: 28
On Thursday, 61 people were rescued and sent up to Thailand after being duped by call-center scammers to operate in Myanmar.
At the second Thai-Myanmar Bridge in Mae Sot city of Tak state, the Myanmar Border Guard Force handed them over to Thai officials.
Before going through a screening process by immigration soldiers, they were welcomed by Defense Minister Phumtham Wechayachai, who was on an assessment trip to the border territory.
The team rescued from the Shwe Kokko advanced in Myawaddy comprised 39 Foreign nationals, 13 Indians, one Kazakh, five Indonesians, one African, one Muslim regional and one Malay.
Additionally, Mr. Phumtham stated that the government is looking into the effects of its determination to halt the supply of electricity to three of Myanmar’s most dangerous regions, including Tak, Kanchanaburi, and Chiang Rai regions.
It is too early to draw any conclusions from the suspension since it only started on Wednesday, according to Mr. Phumtham before heading to Mae Sot area to check operations to combat drug and individuals smuggling along the borders.
First assessments, according to Mr. Phumtham, who also serves as a deputy prime minister, demonstrate that the expulsion of power supplies has had little effect on Thai border areas, but the effect on the Myanmar area is still being looked at.
Resources in Myanmar have said households and small businesses have been affected but the huge murder parties, most of them Chinese-led, had their own producers.
The Provincial Electricity Authority ( PEA ) said the power cutoff would cause it to lose about 600 million baht a year in revenue, which is only 0.1 % of its total, he said.
The deputy prime minister stressed that national safety is the top priority while acknowledging possible financial loss.
According to Mr. Phumtham, illegal activities like call center schemes in Shwe Kokko were thought to have decreased by approximately 40 % after the first day of the energy cut.
Regarding Myanmar’s plans to purchase power from Laos, Mr. Phumtham asserted that it has the right to do so.
Nevertheless, he insisted Thailand’s goal is to secure its borders and break down on legal operations there.
In Thailand only, call-centre schemes have resulted in 557, 500 legal cases and more than 86 billion ringgit in restitution, averaging about 80 million ringgit per day, officials have said.