Second group of suspects in fraud case set to arrive

A group of 100 Taiwanese suspected of fraud will be flown home from Indonesia today in a second round of repatriations following a massive cross-border criminal crackdown, the Criminal Investigation Bureau said yesterday.

The 100 suspects, who were rounded up in Indonesia during the past three months in a massive six-country operation against telecommunications and Internet scams, will be repatriated on a China Airlines chartered plane, the bureau said.

On Saturday, a group of 122 Taiwanese fraud suspects was returned to Taipei from Macau on a private EVA Airways flight.

This second group of suspects was arrested in Cambodia in a joint regional crime-fighting operation, code named “0310,” in which a total of 598 suspects, including 410 Taiwanese and 181 Chinese nationals, were arrested.

Saturday’s repatriations marked the first time in Taiwan’s crime-fighting history that a chartered plane was used to transport suspected criminals.

The bureau sent 60 detectives to escort the 122 suspects from Macau. After the suspects arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport on Saturday, another 40 police officers were dispatched to escort them to Greater Taichung for questioning.

In the “0310” operation, launched on March 10, Taiwanese and Chinese suspects who allegedly used “call centers” to exploit their compatriots were tracked and arrested.

The fraud rings were originally based in coastal cities in Taiwan and China, but they moved their operations to Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia after law enforcement authorities from both sides of the Taiwan Strait strengthened their efforts during the past two years to track them down.

Taiwan mobilized more than 800 police officers to join the regional crackdown on the scams.