U.S. sanctions Myanmar warlord and militia tied to cyber scams

The United States has imposed sanctions on a Myanmar warlord and the militia he leads for their involvement in major cyber scams, including cryptocurrency-related fraud, that have harmed U.S. citizens.

U.S. Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control announced the sanctions against Saw Chit Thu, the warlord leader of the militia group Karen National Army.

The OFAC sanctions are also against Saw Chit Thu’s two sons Saw Htoo Eh Moo and Saw Chit Chit  as well as KNA, with the Treasury Department designating them for not just cyber scam syndicates, but also human trafficking and cross-border smuggling.

Per the Treasury Department, the Myanmar militia group’s transnational crimes include cryptocurrency-related fraud schemes. OFAC noted in the press release that U.S. victims lost over $2 billion in 2022 and more than $3.5 billion in 2023.

On May 1, 2025, the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network identified Cambodian financial institution Huione Group as key money laundering player in the Southeast Asia region.

U.S. authorities say most of the cyber scams hitting Americans emanate from the region. Huione Group, which serves as a critical money laundering conduit for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and criminal organizations, is in the U.S. crosshairs.

Like KNA and others, one of the main scams are via convertible virtual currency investment scams and romance schemes, or pig butchering.

“Scammers present victims with hints of a wealthy, glamorous lifestyle and induce them to “invest” in bogus cryptocurrency and trading platforms controlled by the scammers themselves.  Victims are shown fake “returns” on their investments and duped into investing greater and greater sums until the scammers go silent after stealing everything they can from their victims,” the Treasury Department noted.

The laundering and “pig butchering” scams have netted billions of dollars in revenue for the criminal entities.

According to OFAC, Saw Chit Thu is a key figure in Myanmar’s scam economy, with his ties to the country’s military junta helping his criminal operations enabled from a KNA-controlled zone along Myanmar-Thailand border.  

The United Kingdom and the European Union sanctioned Saw Chit Thu in 2023 and in 2024 respectively.