The United States on Thursday imposed sanctions on Cambodian casino tycoon Ly Yong Phat and his LYP Group conglomerate for alleged abuses related to the treatment of trafficked workers in online scam centers.
The sanctions from the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control also targeted Ly’s O-Smach Resort on the Thai border in northern Cambodia, as well as the Garden City Hotel in Phnom Penh, the Koh Kong Resort in southwestern Cambodia and the Phnom Penh Hotel.
"For more than two years, from 2022 to 2024, O-Smach Resort has been investigated by police and publicly reported on for extensive and systemic serious human rights abuse," the Treasury Department said in a statement.
“Victims reported being lured to O-Smach Resort with false employment opportunities, having their phones and passports confiscated upon arrival, and being forced to work scam operations,” it said.
“People who called for help reported being beaten, abused with electric shocks, made to pay a hefty ransom, or threatened with being sold to other online scam gangs.”
The sanctions under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act are aimed at foreign entities and individuals who are human rights offenders by restricting their financial transactions and commercial activities.
RFA was unable to reach Ly Yong Phat or Cambodian government spokesman Pen Bona for comment on Thursday.
Scam center
Cambodia is one of several Southeast Asian countries where a multibillion-dollar criminal industry has emerged in recent years to target victims around the world with fraudulent schemes.
The State Department's annual Trafficking in Persons Report, released in June, highlighted abuses at online scam centers in Cambodia, spokesman Matthew Miller noted at his regular briefing on Thursday.
The report noted that corruption and official complicity in trafficking crimes “remained widespread and endemic, resulting in selective and often politically-motivated enforcement of laws, thereby inhibiting effective law enforcement action against trafficking crimes, including forced labor in online investment scam operations,” Miller said.
The sanction is a warning to the many Okhnas who have close ties to the family of Senate President Hun Sen and who also do business in the United States or the European Union, Finland-based political commentator Kim Sok told Radio Free Asia.
Hun Sen stepped down as prime minister last year after decades in power. He remains president of the Cambodian People’s Party, or CPP. His son, Hun Manet, was appointed prime minister in August 2023.
“This is suffocating Hun Manet’s government,” Kim Sok said. “The U.S. is stepping on the CPP’s throat. Ly Yong Phat is the one who controls the CPP’s money.”
The title of Oknha is bestowed on Cambodians involved in business who are committed to charity or generous with donations to the government. The title has an unofficial association with the country’s ultra-rich, who often have close ties to top government officials.
Ly Yong Phat is also known for controlling large parts of Cambodia’s sugar industry for more than a decade. According to a 2017 report by Politico, he sometimes sent armed military police to burn villagers’ crops and trees and take their land by force.
Translated by Yun Samean. Edited by Matt Reed and Malcolm Foster.