At least seven Japanese nationals have been taken into protective custody from large-scale scam centers at the Thai-Myanmar border — thought to hold at least 120,000 people — with many more still believed to be in captivity.
The Japanese nationals are among hundreds of thousands of people who police say have been coerced into engaging in online scams. On Thursday, authorities in Thailand began to send back those that had been held at the scam centers in large numbers, with 200 Chinese citizens sent back to their country and hundreds more expected to be in the coming days.
Keiichi Iwamoto, a senior Foreign Ministry official in charge of consular affairs, said Thursday in parliament that two boys — high school students age 16 and 17 — along with five other Japanese nationals had been taken into custody in Thailand. Six of them have already returned to Japan.
With your current subscription plan you can comment on stories. However, before writing your first comment, please create a display name in the Profile section of your subscriber account page.