DetailsRecently, China and Thailand police cracked a telecom fraud in Thailand with a result of 44 suspects being caught and 25 of them are Taiwanese. China Mainland requires Thailand to repatriate all the suspects to China Mainland for trial; while Taiwan authority asserts they would fight for the consequence of Taiwanese suspects being sent back to Taiwan. On 23 July, Thailand police announced that all the 44 suspects will be repatriated to China Mainland as soon as they are convicted.
In the past practices, Thailand police usually deported telecom fraud suspects to China Mainland and Taiwan separately after they are arrested in Thailand. In case these suspects are truly repatriated to mainland, it will be the first time that Thailand doesn¡¯t send Taiwanese suspects back to Taiwan but to the China Mainland after a bilateral agreement on combating transnational economic crimes was signed in 2013 by Taiwan and Thailand.
Taiwan authorities have been dissatisfied with the result. Taiwan Mainland Affairs Council also appeals China Mainland for solving the problem with Taiwan together. However, due to the light sentencing of telecom fraud in Taiwan, illegal cost is so small that telecom fraud is widely adopted in Taiwan. Thus, repatriating Taiwanese telecom fraud suspects to China Mainland seems to be more reasonable and necessary.