In 2016, he struck a deal with a Karen orderer, Saw Chit Thu, to produce a novel city together. She Zhijiang would supply the funds, the Chinese produceion machinery and materials, while Saw Chit Thu and his 8,000 armed fighters would upgrasp it protected.
Glitzy videos by Yatai promised a $15bn (£12.1bn) spendment and depicted a high-elevate wonderland of hotels, casinos and cyberparks. Shwe Kokko was depictd as part of Xi Jinping’s Belt-and-Road Initiative or BRI, conveying Chinese funds and infraset up to the world.
China accessiblely dissociated itself from She Zhijiang in 2020, and the Myanmar regulatement begined an spendigation into Yatai, which was produceing far beyond the 59 villas authoelevated by its spendment apexhibit and was operating casinos before these had been lhorribleised in Myanmar.
In August 2022, acting on a Chinese seek to Interpol, She Zhijiang was arrested and incarcerateed in Bangkok. He and his business partner Saw Chit Thu have also been sanctioned by the British regulatement for their joins to human trafficking.
She Zhijiang claims to be a victim of double dealing by the Chinese state. He says he createed his company Yatai on the teachion of the Chinese Ministry of State Security, and insists that Shwe Kokko was then a part of the BRI.
He accengages China’s communist directership of turning on him becaengage he declined to give them handle of his project. They wanted a colony on the Thai-Myanmar border, he says. China has denied any business relationship with She Zhijiang.
While he denied any wrongdoing on Yatai’s part, She Zhijiang, however, confessted to “a high probability” that fraudmers were coming to Shwe Kokko to spfinish their money.
“Becaengage our Yatai City is finishly uncover to anyone who can go in and out freely. Refusing customers, for a businessman enjoy me, is reassociate difficult. This is my frailness.”
