TOKYO: A 16-year-old Japanese boy has been rescued from a scam syndicate in Myanmar near the Thai border, Thai authorities confirmed on Friday.
According to Kyodo news agency, this comes a day after Thai officials reported that another Japanese youth, a high school student forced to work at a Myanmar-based scam call centre, was rescued last month and returned to Japan.
The two are among many foreign victims of forced labour in the border area, where human trafficking is widespread.
Thailand has been stepping up efforts to curb such activities, including cutting power and fuel supplies to crime hotspots across the border.
Thai authorities said the Japanese boy, taken into protective custody on Wednesday, left the border town of Mae Sot with Japanese Embassy staff.
Meanwhile, Thai immigration police said they had detained a 29-year-old Japanese man suspected of luring the earlier-rescued student, whose gender has not been disclosed, to work at the call centre in Myawaddy, a Myanmar town near Mae Sot.
Nattakorn Reantip, commander of the Thai army’s Ratchamanu Task Force, said more Japanese nationals are likely being held in scam operations across the border. His statement follows last week’s arrest of four Japanese individuals suspected of voluntarily taking part in such activities.
He added that Thailand’s suspension of power supply to Myanmar, which began on 5 February, has increased pressure on scam syndicates. Many of the groups running these operations are believed to be Chinese.
Shortly after the power cuts, over 260 foreign nationals were freed from scam syndicates in Myanmar. An ethnic rebel group in the country later handed them over to authorities in northwestern Thailand.
