A week ago, one of Myanmar’s most powerful ethnic armed alliances launched a coordinated attack on a dozen military outposts in northern Shan State, along the country’s eastern border with China.
Code-named Operation 1027, the plan is to assert and defend territory against Myanmar military incursions, eradicate “oppressive military dictatorship”, and combat online fraud along the border, according to a statement from its organisers, the Three Brotherhood Alliance.
Made up of the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA), Ta’Ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) and Arakan Army (AA), the alliance is part of a coalition of seven ethnic armed organisations which maintain close ties with China and have bases or territories near the country’s border.
A particular target of the operation is the cyber-scamming industry that has boomed in autonomous militarised zones on Myanmar’s eastern border since the February 2021 military coup, generating billions of dollars for Chinese gangs working in collaboration with the Myanmar military, its proxies and other armed groups.
A United Nations report published in August found that an estimated 120,000 people had been trafficked into the industry in Myanmar, where they are forced to scam people around the world and are subject to abuses including torture, sexual violence and other forms of “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment”.
The industry has ensnared Chinese nationals as victims of both trafficking and scamming, and over the past year, the Chinese government has exerted increasing pressure on the Myanmar military to crack down. In recent months, China also launched a series of cross-border operations resulting in the arrest and repatriation of more than 4,500 people, according to a report published last month by the Institute for Strategy and Policy-Myanmar, an independent think tank.
Source from www.aljazeera.com