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US Sanctions Cambodian Senator Linked To Crypto Romance Scam Centers

Authored by Chris Summers via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

The United States on April 23 imposed sanctions on a wealthy Cambodian senator, Kok An, who allegedly ran crypto-romance scam centers that stole millions of dollars from U.S. citizens.

Thai soldiers stand outside an abandoned scam center in O'Smach town on the border between Thailand and Cambodia on March 12, 2026. Lillian Suwanrumpha/AFP via Getty Images

Kok, 71, is a political ally of Hun Sen, who served as Cambodian prime minister for 25 years before stepping down in 2023 and handing power to his son, Hun Manet. The 73-year-old is now president of the Cambodian Senate.

The U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) also sanctioned 28 individuals and entities linked to the suspected scam centers.

“Eliminating fraud is a top priority for the Trump administration,” U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said. “Treasury will continue to target fraudsters and scam centers that steal billions of dollars from hardworking Americans, no matter where they operate or how well-connected they are.”

Industrial-scale cyberscamming, based in scam centers in Burma (also known as Myanmar) and Cambodia, has become a major money-maker for organized crime groups.

The Treasury said in a statement that operators within this network have “stolen millions of dollars from U.S. victims while operating under the protection of Kok An and his political connections.”

Tricked Using ‘Romantic Relationships’

The Treasury said fraudsters use “the lure of friendship or romantic relationships” to coax vulnerable Americans into transferring their savings in the form of digital assets by promising investment opportunities and high returns.

Matthew Hogan, a detective with the Connecticut State Police and an officer on the Secret Service’s Financial Crimes Task Forces, told The Epoch Times last year that the biggest growth has been in long-term scams known as “pig butchering,” which involves luring people into fake cryptocurrency investments. The phrase comes from the Chinese term “sha zhu pan.”

The Treasury said Kok owns numerous companies, including Crown Resorts, and has retrofitted casinos and office parks as scam centers where workers—who are often trafficked from China and other countries—target U.S. citizens and trick people out of cryptocurrency, which is then laundered by Kok’s associates.

“Nearly all major scam compounds in Cambodia are connected to casinos, which serve to launder the proceeds of scams,” the Treasury said.

Kok is a senator from the ruling Cambodian People’s Party. It was founded during the Cold War, and was close to the Soviet Union and later communist Vietnam. It dropped its Marxist-Leninist ideology in the early 1990s.

Andy Jenkinson, a fellow of the Cyber Theory Institute and author of the book “Stuxnet to Sunburst: 20 Years of Digital Exploitation and Cyber Warfare,” told The Epoch Times in April 2025 that the annual losses to cybercrime globally are “over $10 trillion, or put it another way, $32 billion a day.”

Tether Freezes $344 Million USDT

The move was announced hours after stablecoin issuer Tether froze $344 million in its USDT stablecoin, allegedly linked to “sanctions evasion, criminal networks, or other illicit activity.”

“When wallets are identified as connected to sanctions evasion, criminal networks, or other illicit activity, Tether can move to restrict those assets,” Tether said.

The company also said it maintained a zero-tolerance policy toward the criminal use of USDT, and has long followed OFAC guidelines on sanctioned individuals and entities.

Reuters contributed to this report.

Tyler Durden Fri, 04/24/2026 - 19:00

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Video Game Triggers Leftist Mob With Story Of Man Protecting A Child

The political left has proven time and time again that they hate inherent masculine traits, almost as much as they hate the nuclear family and healthy population growth in the west.  Positive portrayals of the heterosexual nuclear family are in steep decline.  Children are rarely seen in media, with a disturbing uptick in adults acting like children while marketing products typically reserved for kids.  

It's as if children and happy families are being erased from popular culture.  

This agenda is made even more apparent by the bizarre reactions of feminists and left wing activists to any positive portrayals of normal family dynamics.  Specifically, straight white male role models and white fathers are not allowed to enter the picture.  If there is any form of family in media, it must be a single mother and "girl boss" raising the children on her own, or, mixed-ethnicity couples.  Even then, fatherly influence is largely diminished. 

This propaganda rule especially applies to video games where young men are most likely to be exposed.  The recent release of the sci-fi action game "Pragmata" has caused a significant stir on social media, triggering the feminist gestapo and enraging them.  In response, they have launched a disturbing (and revealing) propaganda campaign to associate the game with "pedophile content". 

Even left-wing gaming media outlet Kotaku has noticed the strange reaction among woke activists to "Diana", suggesting that this is an overreaction by a society now overwhelmed by the Epstein Files (though most people have never actual read them), as well as dark tales of child abuse from the bowels of studios like Nickelodeon. 

Though, they still attempt to justify leftist paranoia by claiming that the right wing's defense of the game and its positive messaging on fatherhood is causing the reaction.  In other words, conservatives viewing it as a cultural "win" against the woke erasure of fathers in entertainment is the rationale for the political left's crash-out.  Conservatives argue that if leftists see pedophilia in every interaction between a man and a child, then this is likely a self-report on their own evil impulses.  

If Capcom's goal with Pragmata was to make everyone who plays this game want to be a parent, then they've done an amazing job.

I always sit back when Diana starts playing and think to myself "so this is what is like having a daughter"

She's so cute pic.twitter.com/PsTMnTK6eo

— NikTek (@NikTek) April 19, 2026

It's not only feminists on the left that are acting crazy in response to Pragmata, though.  Some women in centrist and even some conservative circles are posting some of the most unhinged and unscientific commentary, suggesting that childless men are incapable of fatherly instincts, and any single men who feel a fatherly connection to the child character must be exhibiting hidden pedophile tendencies.

lots of strange reactions to this game. let’s clear some things up:

childless men do not have paternal instincts the way that childless women have maternal instincts (we observe this even in the way little girls play vs. little boys).

men first experience paternal instincts… https://t.co/1PCQgzbqOp

— mary morgan (@maryarchived) April 20, 2026

This is how pervasive the anti-masculinity narrative has become in western society.  Every interaction between men and women or men and children is viewed through a communist lens of power dynamics and predatory sexuality.  The fact that the vast majority of men are good is contrary to the agenda.  Only 3.9% of men are convicted of a violent crime.  Only 1% of men commit persistent crime.  Only 0.5% of men are convicted of sexual assault.        

When it comes to the sexualization narrative, the primary problem is, of course, that the child in the game is an android, not a human.  The fact that feminists and their ilk are hysterical over the presence of a robot child in a game is hilarious enough, but we have to keep in mind that this is not about the child and they do not actually care about pedo content in media. 

Remember, these are the same people that defended the Netflix release of "Cuties", a film made by a Muslim director which depicts actual 11-year-old girls engaging in highly sexualized scenarios.  Leftists in Hollywood have been sexualizing children in media for decades.  What they are actually upset about is the fact that the game portrays a man acting like a father, and they hate the possibility that young men will see this and be inspired.

Case in point, far-left streamer and "influencer" Hasan Piker expressed disgust over Pragmata, not because of imaginary pedophilia, but because the game might convince "loser gamers" to want a family someday.  Piker laments that people he calls “unf*ckable losers in the gaming sphere” are talking about starting families, which he doesn’t understand.  He argues that having a family is “not something that [they’re] gonna experience, ever, for the rest of their lives.”  

It should be noted that Hasan Piker is 34 and has no children.

Finally, in the bowels of the Marxist cesspool known as Reddit, moderators on some of the biggest gaming boards are censoring any positive mentions of Pragmata, indicating that the conspiracy against the messaging is widespread. 

Reddit is banning you if say nice things about PRAGMATA.

The Leftist activist freaking out about this game has to be studied.

They can’t stand wholesome family values.

They instantly project “pedo” whenever they see a kid because they have no kids and can’t imagine a parental… pic.twitter.com/kBhFbevAzw

— Grummz (@Grummz) April 19, 2026

As usual, the cancel culture mob has failed to prevent the game's success.  Pragmata has sold over 1 million copies in just a two days, and is set to become one of the most successful games of 2026.  The reason is obvious; it appeals to the largest demographic for action games:  Young men.  Not only because of the action content, but because the game gives them someone to fight for. 

It is this instinct within men that the political left fears more than anything.  

Tyler Durden Fri, 04/24/2026 - 18:30

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