FROM THE LUNCH TABLE TO THE FBI PODIUM: THAI POLICE GENERAL VISANU AND THE SANCTIONED CYBER SCAM OPERATORS
On June 8th 2026 Amnesty International released a damning report - Falling Through the Cracks: Cambodia’s “Crackdown” on Scamming Compounds. It catalogues the Cambodian government's complete failure to deal with the various cyberscam centers within their own borders and the impact this failure to act has had. In short, the litany of human rights' abuses associated with these centers are horrific and include rape, torture, human trafficking and human slavery.
Whilst Amnesty were coordinating the release of their new report from their HQ in London, England, on the other side of the world a gathering was taking place in Grande Centre Point Hotel, a top-end 5 star establishment in downtown Bangkok.
After Police General Kittirat Phanphet, Commissioner General of the Royal Thai Police, officially opened the 26th FBI National Academy Associates (FBINAA) Asia Pacific Chapter Retraining Conference, Pol. Gen. Visanu Prasatthong-Osoth (ret), President of the FBI-NA Alumni Association of Thailand, got up and stated the main theme of the conference to the assembled delegates.
Visanu (sometimes transliterated as Wisanu) walked up to the microphone and without any hint of irony or sarcasm stated to the over 200 law enforcement officers from over 20 countries, Sean K. O'Neill, the US Ambassador to Thailand and Andrew Bailey, Joint Deputy Director of the FBI that the main theme of the conference was "United in Action: Combating Transnational Organized Crime in the Digital Age".
How the assembled throng kept a straight face is anyone's guess.
The 1000s of comments left by the Thai public on Thai newspaper The Standard's Facebook post about the event revealed that they clearly weren't impressed.
And it's no wonder.
The recently released photograph of Jirabhop Bhuridej meeting with US sanctioned Cambodian cyber scam center operator Rithy Raksmei was from a lunch meeting.
Guess who else was there chowing down? Pol. Gen. Visanu Prasatthong-Osoth (ret). And as he retired in late 2023 and the Thai police claimed the meeting was in November 2024 (the people who released the photo stated it was May 2025, something the Thai police refuted. We are 99% certain - shock horror - that the Thai police lied), what on earth was Visanu doing there?
But there's more. With someone like Visanu there's always more.
Ly Yong Phat is a notorious Cambodian-Thai dual national who is reputedly very closely involved with the kinds of cyberscam centers that Amnesty are so concerned about. So closely involved that in September 2024 the US Government sanctioned him.
We suppose you can guess the next part.
Yep, there's a photo of Visanu at a function at the Phnom Penh Hotel in Cambodia (we're not sure of the date of the photo but this hotel is a business specifically mentioned in the US sanction statement) hanging out with Ly Yong Phat.
So there you have it. This is the best Thailand can produce at a regional convention for FBI training alumni where the central theme is "United in Action: Combating Transnational Organized Crime in the Digital Age". A former leading Thai police officer who seems to have had repeated unexplained and friendly get-togethers with the very criminals the United States are seeking to prosecute.
No wonder ordinary Thais, sick to the back teeth of the likes of Wisanu, are mocking and laughing at the FBI.
Because if you don't even know who you're in bed with, don't expect the truth to tuck you in at night.
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