‘We call them criminal nomads’: 200 Chinese scam suspects took over 11-storey block in Cambodian capital
Police in the Cambodian capital accuse them of setting up a criminal call centre with more than 200 Chinese nationals to carry out a telephone and internet scam
No sooner had the 11-storey block of flats in Phnom Penh’s affluent Tuol Kouk district been finished than dozens of young Chinese men and women moved in loaded with desks and laptops, said neighbours.
“I thought they were moving an office in,” said Eng Somnang, 20, who owns a noodle soup shop directly opposite and watched them arrive early this month.
Police in the Cambodian capital accuse them of setting up a criminal call centre with more than 200 Chinese nationals to carry out a telephone and internet scam on victims in China.
Police raided the building on Wednesday to stop what they said was the latest operation of a type that has duped people out of billions of dollars – with scammers operating from countries that have good internet access and relaxed visa rules.
From a balcony of the building in Phnom Penh, some of the suspects said they had not been given food and police were not allowing them to leave.
They were mostly men, some women. Maybe 20, 23 years old. Young. When people delivered food to them they were not allowed inside
One of the suspects, Fang, 30, from China, said she came to Cambodia on a tourist visa. She said there were more than 200 people inside the building but declined to answer questions about what they had been doing there.