Water prisons, torture: UN urges crackdown on brutal Southeast Asia scam centres

The agency released a report documenting torture, sexual abuse, forced abortions, food deprivation, solitary confinement and other abuses.

“The litany of abuse is staggering and at the same time heartbreaking,” UN Human Rights high commissioner Volker Turk said, calling on governments to act against corruption that was “deeply entrenched in such lucrative scamming operations, and to prosecute the criminal syndicates behind them”.

The UNHCR agency had already said in a 2023 report that hundreds of thousands of people were forced to work in the centres, that other investigations have found are responsible for billions of dollars of online fraud.

Based on accounts from victims, police and civil society groups, the report said forced labourers had described being held in immense compounds resembling self-contained towns, made up of heavily fortified multi-storey buildings with barbed wire-topped walls and armed guards.