US and UK Sanction Prince Group for Online Scams in Southeast Asia

The United States and the United Kingdom announced coordinated sanctions on Tuesday targeting a Southeast Asia based criminal network accused of operating large-scale online scam centres that used trafficked workers to defraud people worldwide. The action, led by the U.S. Treasury and British foreign ministry, blacklists a web of companies and individuals tied to the Prince Group conglomerate and freezes assets linked to the network, including properties in London, officials said.

U.S. authorities designated the Prince Group and affiliated entities a transnational criminal organization and sanctioned 146 people and companies. Prosecutors unsealed an indictment charging Chen Zhi, the group’s chairman, with wire fraud and money laundering and filed what they described as a major forfeiture action, seizing billions of dollars in cryptocurrency. The U.K. announced sanctions on six entities and individuals and said it had frozen 19 London properties worth more than 100 million pounds. Those properties are reported to include a mansion on Avenue Road and office space on Fenchurch Street in the City of London.

Governments say the network ran purpose-built compounds and repurposed...