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Bangkok Post
Bangkok Post
National

Police to revoke woman's Thai citizenship

Ms Navaporn, centre, is shown the court warrant for her arrest as she is taken into custody by police at the building she owns on Silom road, in Bang Rak district, on April 8. (Police photo)

The Royal Thai Police (RTP) will work with the Interior Ministry to revoke the Thai citizenship of a Chinese woman who has a long history of alleged involvement in fraud, human trafficking, surrogacy and document forgery.

The 53-year-old Chinese woman, identified as Navaporn Phakiatsakul, was arrested on April 8 in a building on Silom Road in Bang Rak district following a crackdown on four spots in Bangkok, one of which was her house in Sathon Soi 10 in Yannawa district.

Ms Navaporn would give false information to authorities to help her compatriots obtain non-citizen identification cards, or pink cards, by claiming they were relatives who had moved to her house, police said on Saturday.

A probe showed Ms Navaporn obtained her Thai citizenship after marrying a Thai man around 1988-1989. She divorced her husband in 1991, before obtaining citizenship in 1992.

"Afterwards, she became a surrogate mother for Chinese nationals, resulting in all her children legitimately having Thai nationality, with the right to own assets and land worth billions of baht in the kingdom," police said.

In addition, Ms Navaporn would also procure other women for surrogacy, who then gave birth in a neighbouring country with the cooperation of Thai doctors. Police found that 26 women in the building claimed to be Ms Navaporn's relatives, as recorded at Bang Rak District Office.

Police also pressed charges against her for falsifying and using fake official documents, giving false information to authorities and using fake visa stamps on international travel documents. "The woman will face punishment in Thailand first before she and all her children are deported," police said.

Police want to revoke Ms Navaporn's Thai citizenship.

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