War with Thailand pushed Cambodia to enact a sweeping scam crackdown. Now the ruling elite is leveraging the same crackdown to consolidate its political control.
The remains of Me Teuk Bridge, previously the primary route into Thmor Da, in Cambodia’s Pursat province, as seen on Aug. 6, 2026. The bridge was destroyed by a Thai F-16 airstrike on Dec. 13, 2025.
Credit: Nathan Paul Southern"A spokesperson for the Thai Ministry of Information did not respond
to specific questions about civilian casualties at occupied scam
compounds, but claimed all operations were “directed strictly at
military targets.” The spokesperson claimed that Cambodian armed forces
turned scam workers into human shields by using compounds as military
bases and arms depots, launching attacks on Thailand from inside these
sites, and that Thailand only discovered that industrial-scale online
scams were operating after threats were neutralized and inspections
conducted."
"However, on multiple visits to O’Smach and Thmor Da since July 2025 we documented Thai surveillance drones closely monitoring areas with buildings densely populated by people who were clearly unable to leave. We could find no evidence that occupied compounds targeted by Thailand were being used by the Cambodian military, and no survivors interviewed said they witnessed this.
“I never saw any [Cambodian] soldier,” said Paul. “Nobody was firing back. Just the attack from Thailand.”
It was two days after Christmas, just before 7 a.m., when Paul heard the first explosion. The 50-year-old Nigerian national had struggled to make a living as an English teacher in Vietnam and applied for a well-paid admin job in Cambodia, only to find he’d been sold to a criminal group running online scams. Beaten and tortured into compliance, he had been transported from site to site as bosses raced to evade a wave of raids on the country’s brutal scam compounds – by this point estimated to hold hundreds of thousands of people who, like Paul (we have changed his name for his safety), had been trafficked into forced criminal labor in the scam and illegal gambling industry.
By December, he was in Choam, a tiny jungle outpost where Khmer Rouge dictator Pol Pot is buried, confined to a scam compound complex centered around a casino that once served Thai gamblers hopping across the land border. That border had been closed since June, just before fighting broke out between Cambodia and Thailand. Now, after months of fragile peace, the conflict had erupted again.
Bosses told workers not to panic; Choam was not a target. Plus, Paul had never seen any sign of Cambodian soldiers or military vehicles from the windows of his guarded office-dormitory, and by the morning of December 27, the two sides had already negotiated a ceasefire. But hours before it came into effect, Thailand attacked.
“The next thing we start hearing, seeing drones. Blasting. Bombing upon bombing,” said Paul, his voice shaking. He says he survived by sheltering in a concrete drain, while scam bosses frantically hung Chinese flags from windows to show Thai surveillance the buildings were not Cambodian-controlled, but the main hotel-casino was hit again and again.
“A lot of people died there. And on the road, strings of bullets tearing the body of people’s cars,” he said. “If a bullet can tear a car [like that], what about a human being?”
The border dispute that sparked the conflict goes back decades, but targeting and capturing scam industry infrastructure under the guise of combatting crime has been weaponized as a tactic by both sides since mid-2025, when the Thai military began bombing scam hubs on Cambodian soil. The Thai military framed this as an effort to contain a global security threat that generates huge illicit revenues while fueling corruption and instability, and declared the conflict to be, in part, a “war against scammers.” Cambodia initially accused Thailand of exaggerating the scale of the problem as a pretext for illegal incursions into its territory, but faced with a far stronger and better-equipped army, and under pressure from countries it relies on for military aid, the government swiftly changed direction, launching a comprehensive crackdown on domestic scam compounds.
At first, it looked like Cambodia’s political elites were cornered. To repair frayed relationships with the United States and China, they not only had to admit the scale of forced online criminality compounds operating with impunity across the country but potentially sacrifice an industry worth half the country’s GDP and pivotal in cementing complicit elites’ grip on power. But instead of losing their hold over the country, Cambodia’s ruling families have turned the scam crackdown to their advantage, leveraging this diplomatic rehabilitation project to boost Cambodia’s military might, commandeer billions of dollars’ worth of real estate built and funded by criminal investors, and consolidate authoritarian control.
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FBI Director Kash Patel meets with Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet to discuss the Cambodian government’s anti-scam crackdown in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, July 22, 2026. Photo credit: Facebook/Samdech Thipadei Hun Manet, Prime Minister of Cambodia
Having spent years denying the existence of a large-scale, entrenched online scam industry, and even punishing those who attempted to expose it, Cambodian officials now claim their crackdown drove 300,000 scammers out of the country and saw over 250 compounds closed. While some of these compounds may be a single building, others are huge, interconnected real estate projects with their own supporting infrastructure, collectively constituting entire towns that had been purpose-built by criminal investors to the tune of billions of dollars. In June, Senior Minister Chhay Sinarith, who chairs Cambodia’s Commission for Combating Online Scams, told Channel News Asia that all these locations “have been converted into state property.”
This represents a staggering transfer of private assets into the hands of an increasingly autocratic government dominated by a clique of political dynasties whose own family members and company co-directors are linked to the scam compounds that have now been seized. That includes #8 Park and Golden Fortune Science & Technology Park, two “vile” forced online criminality compounds that had been designated for sanctions by the United Kingdom, U.S., and European Union as part of the Prince Holding Group. Prince Group is a Cambodia-headquartered conglomerate described by the U.S. Treasury Department as a “global criminal enterprise built on scam compounds, fraud and money laundering.”
Its founder, Chen Zhi, was appointed a personal adviser (with rank equivalent to a government minister) to Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet; his father, former Prime Minister Hun Sen; former Interior Minister Sar Kheng; and to his son, the current Interior Minister Sar Sokha, who at one stage is reported to have co-owned Jinbei Casino, another entity targeted in the scam crackdown, alongside Chen himself. Sokha denies the reports.
In late May, Sar Sokha used an American lobbying firm to file a petition to remove his name from a draft U.S. bill listing key international cyberscam targets. Ten days later, the General Department of Prisons – overseen by Sar Sokha’s Interior Ministry – posted photos of the recently emptied #8 Park site, describing this as a new construction site that could be used as a prison facility.
Another prison-like scam compound has also been transformed by the Interior Ministry into a literal prison: the former “Mango 2 Park” compound, now an immigration detention center. Some trafficking survivors who managed to escape amid the chaos of conflict and crackdowns now find themselves here, in a building previously owned by one of the same types of criminal group that initially enslaved them.
Videos shared with The Diplomat of open sewage running through chronically overcrowded dormitories-turned-cells in stifling tropical heat suggest living conditions under the new management may be even worse.
This appears to be part of a broader strategy by Cambodia to expand prison capacity. New facilities are being built all over the country to ease critical overcrowding. Cambodia’s prison population has tripled over the past decade, pushing the system to more than 400 percent of its capacity. Some three-quarters of the population in some prisons are languishing at the pre-trial stage or awaiting final verdict, which can take years.
The spike in the prison population has been driven largely by sweeping arrests for minor drug offenses, but the past few years have seen draconian censorship laws increasingly target political opponents, environmental activists, protesters, and even social media users for simply resharing posts critical of government policy or its handling of the war with Thailand. In February, two Cambodian journalists were sentenced to 14 years in prison for “supplying a foreign state with information prejudicial to national defense,” after taking a photo with soldiers at the border that inadvertently appeared to show unplanted landmines in the background.
The ruins of a casino now occupied by Thai troops in Thmor Da, Pursat province, Cambodia, Aug. 6, 2026. Photo by Nathan Paul Southern.
There are concerns that this growing prison population is providing a literally captive workforce for a renewed war effort. Since May, the government began transferring nearly 800 juvenile offenders to prisons along the Thai border as part of a “vocational” program to assist military operations. Backtracking on an earlier proposal to use juveniles to build trenches and defensive infrastructure, Prime Minister Hun Manet said that participants will not serve in combat roles, but are deployed in engineering and construction supporting the military in parts of Pursat province close to the occupied scam town of Thmor Da, and in Oddar Meanchey province, home to scam compound-heavy flashpoints like Choam and the border town of O’Smach.
When we visited O’Smach in April, the Thai military was still occupying bombed-out compounds, and even giving media tours to journalists who appeared to ask no questions about the numbers of casualties or legal justifications for treating trafficking compounds as military targets. Most local residents had fled, but some of those remaining told us that regular Thai surveillance drones and occasional fighter jets still flew into Cambodian air space, and that small arms fire at the border was common.
When we tried to get a closer look at one notorious casino-compound on Cambodian soil, warning shots rang out from Thai military positions. Less than 12 hours later, Thai soldiers again opened fire during a visit to the border checkpoint by an international delegation of diplomats and military attachés, sparking concerns by the British Embassy in Phnom Penh. (A Thai Ministry of Information spokesperson said that all allegations of encroachment into Cambodian territory were “unfounded.”)
Thailand’s strategy of centering scam compounds in the conflict may have backfired militarily. Despite concerns raised by the rights group Amnesty International and international media over the sincerity of Cambodia’s scam crackdown and the humanitarian fallout, the country’s political and military leaders are already reaping the rewards from countries whose economies have been hit hardest by the online scam and illegal gambling industry.
In January, a U.S. vessel docked at Ream Naval Base for the first time, following years of concerns by Washington that the base, which was recently refurbished with Chinese support, would become a Chinese military asset. In March, senior officers from the Royal Cambodian Army and the U.S. Army Pacific held planning discussions for the revival of the Angkor Sentinel exercises, which had been suspended since 2017.
In April, when Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi visited both Thailand and Cambodia, he called for Bangkok to respect the ceasefire and offered to help broker a peaceful resolution to the conflict, but described China’s relationship with Cambodia as an “unbreakable bond” and pledged to collaborate on defense and national security – while urging Phnom Penh to keep working to eradicate scams In June, 39 Chinese Type-59D tanks arrived in Phnom Penh. This year’s Golden Dragon exercises were the largest joint military drills ever conducted between the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces and the People’s Liberation Army, incorporating land, sea, and air operations.
China also made good on a 2024 commitment to deliver two Type-056C corvettes warships in April and June. India has offered Cambodia surveillance drones, demining kits, and military technology to help modernize its armed forces, and in July, Japan officially signed an agreement with Cambodia to provide defense equipment under its Official Security Assistance framework.
Cambodia is also courting Russia as a potential partner. In April, two Russian naval vessels made a three-day visit to Sihanoukville port. Defense Minister Tea Seiha subsequently called for expanded military cooperation with Moscow, including increased training and joint exercises, and Hun Manet had a one-on-one meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in June. Since then, the Russian ambassador to Cambodia has hailed a new era of Cambodia and Russia relations and said Russia is ready to strengthen Cambodia’s defense sector.
Meanwhile, Cambodia’s domestic defense spending continues to expand. The country’s national budget for 2026 hit a new record of more than $10 billion, including increased allocations for defense and security, with projected growth in military expenditure in coming years. In May, a new conscription law came into effect that requires all Cambodian men aged 18 to 25 to serve two years in the military.
Seun Sam, a policy analyst at the Royal Academy of Cambodia, says he is “very concerned” that a third round of fighting is on the horizon, especially if the Thai government seeks to appeal to hardline nationalists at home, or the Thai military begins creating “facts on the ground,” building new infrastructure in occupied territory. He believes Cambodia has now sourced sufficient military equipment from around the world to defend itself, but conflict would bring destruction, economic losses, and human suffering to both nations, while providing no meaningful long-term solution.
“Even if Cambodia were unable to achieve a complete military victory, it would still have the capability to inflict significant damage on parts of Thailand if all available military resources were employed,” Seun Sam said. “The fundamental question, however, is: what would be the benefit of creating a war?”
A Thai soldier mans a barrier made of shipping containers along the border between Thailand and Cambodia in Thmor Da commune, Pursat province, Aug. 6, 2026. Photo by Nathan Paul Southern.
It seems only a matter of time. Eight months after the ceasefire, Thai soldiers continue to occupy the ruins of former scam zones and other territories along the border in Pursat, Oddar Meanchey, Banteay Meanchey, and Preah Vihear provinces, and tensions threaten to boil over.
On August 6, on the way into Thmor Da – a casino and scam enclave perched atop a mountain, surrounded by forest – UXO warning signs peppered a blown-up bridge that was once the main route in and out. Road signs and roadblocks set up by the Thai military were spray-painted with the word “thieves” in English and Khmer.
The town itself was cut in half by a wall of shipping containers, forming makeshift barracks for the Thai soldiers stationed there, beyond which loomed the skeleton of a former casino where the Thai army reported seizing a cache of weapons in December (Cambodia denies this). Meters from the barricade, Cambodian soldiers, now the town’s only residents, hung around old compounds. These were packed when we last came here in November, and a Rwandan trafficking survivor said he was still trapped inside one when it was rocked by Thai artillery fire at the height of the war.
Neither side has shown much interest in seeking justice for victims or dismantling the multi-billion-dollar scam industry. Analysis of Telegram channels used by scam bosses suggests many simply relocated, while the raids and bombings left tens of thousands of exploited foreign nationals re-trafficked, stranded, and destitute, or placed in immigration detention. Of the dozens of survivors we interviewed, not one had been screened for trafficking nor asked to give witness statements to police, despite many having crucial evidence they were willing to share with a criminal investigation.
In December, when we arrived at the Cambodian border town of O’Smach in the immediate aftermath of an aerial bombing, several active scam compound complexes, designed to hold tens of thousands of trafficking victims, were engulfed in flames, with a handful of taxis shuttling back and forth to collect some of those who had escaped. One child trafficking survivor sold to a scam group here later described how, as Thai attacks closed in, captors made them choose between relocation to another scamming site or staying behind to risk joining the mounting death toll.
A spokesperson for the Thai Ministry of Information did not respond to specific questions about civilian casualties at occupied scam compounds, but claimed all operations were “directed strictly at military targets.” The spokesperson claimed that Cambodian armed forces turned scam workers into human shields by using compounds as military bases and arms depots, launching attacks on Thailand from inside these sites, and that Thailand only discovered that industrial-scale online scams were operating after threats were neutralized and inspections conducted.
However, on multiple visits to O’Smach and Thmor Da since July 2025 we documented Thai surveillance drones closely monitoring areas with buildings densely populated by people who were clearly unable to leave. We could find no evidence that occupied compounds targeted by Thailand were being used by the Cambodian military, and no survivors interviewed said they witnessed this.
“I never saw any [Cambodian] soldier,” said Paul. “Nobody was firing back. Just the attack from Thailand.”
Meanwhile, the ruling Hun family are doing little to dispel the sense that the rumbling conflict emboldens its increasingly iron-fisted rule. In July, a Thai analyst published an article warning that engaging in a forever war with Cambodia could help entrench the autocratic regime of Hun Sen, who handed the prime minister role to his son in 2023, but remains head of the Senate and is widely seen as the country’s true political driver. Rather than the usual protestations that Cambodia is fully democratic, Hun Sen shared his own Cambodian translation of the article on Facebook, saying he would make “no additional comments” but simply “leave the text for the citizens of both nations to consider.”
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