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Aidan Jones

Authorities in Thailand are unravelling a “phantom birth’’ racket involving possibly hundreds of babies – mainly Chinese – falsely registered as Thais by corrupt officials so that their parents can gain land and company ownership rights.
Scores of birth certificates have come under scrutiny, with several officials arrested for suspected bribery in a scam that first came to light in northern Chiang Mai but has since clustered around a Bangkok suburb and northeastern Nakhon Ratchasima province.
Babies born to Chinese parents have been registered at addresses that no longer exist or to households without children. Local men have also been paid – or unwittingly used – to be named as fathers on birth certificates, automatically conferring Thai citizenship on the babies.
A police task force set up to investigate the widening scandal believes some of the false registrations may be linked to Chinese cyber scammers seeking to launder money through companies they can fully control.
Last week, Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul told reporters his government would leave no stone unturned in cracking down on the scam, whose full scale is yet to be understood.

“It started from a small point in the north, expanded gradually, and has now reached Bangkok,” Anutin said on Thursday. “There are still thousands more cases. We already have a good picture of these networks and their operations. We believe they will stop using the old methods and try to find new ones – but it won’t be as easy as before.”
Under Thai law, foreigners may hold only minority stakes in land and companies, a measure designed to keep ownership domestic and give Thais a foothold in businesses that overseas capital would otherwise dominate.
But loopholes and corruption have long plagued the system, allowing foreign nationals from China, Russia, Israel and India, among others, to illegally set up front companies and own land.
Other foreigners have fallen victim to false advertising, believing they are legitimately investing or buying land through illicit companies with no legal standing to sell it.
‘No actual births’
The latest revelations pivot around Pho Klang in Nakhon Ratchasima after 27 allegedly false birth certificates were traced back to the subdistrict.
Several civil servants are accused of taking thousands of US dollars’ worth of bribes to stamp home registration documents and fake birth certificates from local hospitals for babies born to foreign parents.
On Thursday, immigration police at Suvarnabhumi Airport stopped a Chinese national from leaving Thailand with a 10-month-old Chinese boy carrying a birth certificate issued by the Pho Klang municipality.
“The phantom birth registration syndicate exploited the laxness of the system – anyone could fabricate official documents, from hospital birth certificates to marriage certificates, with ease,” Pho Klang Mayor Kittipong Pongsurawet said in an interview.
“What made the scheme truly dangerous, however, was the involvement of Thai authorities who knew the ins and outs of the system from within … The ultimate victims are the state and the municipality. Faking identities is a national security issue.”


One local resident told Thai television that officials recently came to her address to check three births, only to find empty land: she had demolished the house years earlier.
“I don’t even have any grandchildren,” she said, adding that another adult’s name had been falsely added to her house registration without her knowledge.
In a statement on Saturday, the police task force said six suspects had been arrested in Nakhon Ratchasima after officers found “no actual births had taken place” at listed hospitals.
“Thai nationals listed as fathers were interviewed and all confirmed they were not the biological father,” it said.
“A municipal registry official confessed to having falsely used the names of Thai fathers and hospitals to unlawfully issue birth certificates so that the children would acquire Thai nationality through their listed father. This constitutes corruption by state officials.”
Corruption remains endemic in Thailand, where scandals ranging from bilked state funds and substandard building materials to rampant online gambling are often traced back to under-the-table payments to officials.
Scam money from the vast crime hubs – mainly led by Chinese criminals on Thailand’s borders with Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia – has also inundated the country, as criminals needing to launder vast sums seek out Thai bank account holders, companies and properties.
Hundreds of millions of US dollars’ worth of assets have been seized in police crackdowns over the past year and a half.


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Police believe that some Chinese cyber scammers are using these false registrations to launder money through firms they can fully control


Police believe that some Chinese cyber scammers are using these false registrations to launder money through firms they can fully control.


‘Phantom birth’ scam spooks Thailand as hundreds of babies get fake citizenship

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Police believe that some Chinese cyber scammers are using these false registrations to launder money through firms they can fully control

Police believe that some Chinese cyber scammers are using these false registrations to launder money through firms they can fully control