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January 23, 2026
Hello John,
This week we revealed ([link removed]) that Thomas Xu — a “Cambodian” investor making big promises in the country of Georgia — is a convicted methamphetamine manufacturer in his native Taiwan.

You can read more about Xu below. But his case also points to a bigger-picture issue: Ties between organized crime and legitimate businesses.

At the center of our story is Lixin Group, the real-estate conglomerate that once touted Xu as its chairman, but now firmly disavows any connection to him.

There are other signs that something is amiss with Lixin: The group’s flagship project in Georgia, a pair of sinuous interconnected towers in the booming seaside city of Batumi, is still a hole in the ground — and the architectural renderings bear a striking resemblance to an unrelated Zaha Hadid project.
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Lixin is building an entire new city in Cambodia and claims to hold 35 million square meters of land. But a 2025 report published by the U.N. Office of Drugs and Crime describes a major Cambodian developer — anonymized as “Business Group 2” — as a front for a major criminal network involved in drugs, online gambling, and cyber fraud.

Multiple people involved confirmed to OCCRP that “Business Group 2” was Lixin. Lixin Group has not been charged in connection with drug trafficking. But reporters found other troubling ties.

For example, Chinese courts found employees of a Cambodian company called “Lixin” guilty of fraud tied to bogus stock and crypto schemes — and describe a “property department” funneling the proceeds into real estate to legitimize them.

This is not the only Cambodian conglomerate that has come under scrutiny by law enforcement. U.S. prosecutors allege that the Prince Group, a Cambodian real-estate giant, ran forced-labor scam compounds and laundered the proceeds through an international web of front companies and “legitimate” ventures.

Both conglomerates also pursued growth the old-fashioned way: by cultivating ties with local power brokers. What’s new and interesting in the case of Lixin is its expansion beyond Southeast Asia.

Without more effective cross-border enforcement, the same model will likely surface in other jurisdictions vulnerable to corruption.

Lixin told OCCRP it was unaware of the U.N. report and denied wrongdoing; it also denied any link to the Chinese fraud cases.

Read our investigation ([link removed]) for more.

The analysis above is a free preview of our upcoming OCCRP PRO membership, a new offering tailored to professionals who rely on our investigations for work in finance, law, compliance, risk management, policy, and related fields. Interested to learn more? Let us know and tell us what you need! ([link removed]) Your feedback will directly shape the services we build.


** OCCRP Investigation
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** How A Fugitive Meth Kingpin Posed as a Tycoon in Georgia
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With hundreds of millions of dollars of investments in the pipeline, and promises to contribute to Georgia’s Black Sea city of Batumi, Thomas Xu seemed like the perfect foreign investor. But he had a secret: the Taiwan-born businessman was a convicted drug criminal.

Xu (born Hsu Ming-chin) fled Taiwan in 2014 after being convicted of manufacturing methamphetamines, and went on to gain citizenship in the Philippines and Cambodia.

He is also suspected by police in multiple countries of financing a $364-million drug shipment in 2016, linked to a major Asian drug trafficking network known as the Sam Gor syndicate. (Xu did not respond to requests for comment.)

Georgian media reports from 2021 gushed that he had been so taken with Batumi that he had opted to relocate his family there. He was referred to as a Cambodia-born investor who planned to make investments worth 1 billion Georgian lari (about $370 million).

Xu also cultivated legitimacy through highly visible philanthropy and sports sponsorship. In May 2022, he appeared at the stadium of Dinamo Batumi, ​​a powerhouse of the Georgian football league, to accept a plaque naming him the team’s honorary president.

Read the full story → ([link removed])


** How Cambodia Became a Haven For Criminals
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Cambodia has emerged as a global epicenter for cyberscams, and was home to one of the biggest synthetic drug labs ever detected. Its citizens have been involved in an array of Southeast Asia’s most infamous — and lucrative — transnational crimes.

How did it come to be so?

OCCRP’s Asia Editor Tom Allard traces ([link removed]) the country’s recent history, where corruption and entrenched patronage networks — as well as its “payment for passports” citizenship-by-investment scheme — have proved fertile ground for organized crime.

Read the explainer → ([link removed])
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** More OCCRP Reporting
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** Journalists Identify Hospital Where Ukrainian POW Was Purposefully Disfigured During Surgery
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One week after Ukrainian soldier Andriy Pereverziev underwent surgery in a hospital in eastern Ukraine’s Russian-occupied Donetsk, he discovered that “Glory to Russia” and “Z” had been branded on his stomach.

The burns were consistent with a tool that uses electricity to make cuts and cauterize wounds, medical experts told Schemes, the investigative unit of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Ukrainian service.

Pereverziev had been badly wounded in battle and was captured, beaten, and interrogated by Russian troops. He was then brought to a hospital for surgery, which staff referred to as “Republican Clinical Hospital.”

Schemes has now identified the facility as the Donetsk Clinical Territorial Medical Association — and found that the hospital has hosted members of a Russian volunteer doctors group — including two surgeons who were present at the hospital when Pereverziev was disfigured.

Their findings are part of a broader pattern of alleged abuses committed by medical personnel against captured Ukrainians.

Last year, an investigation from OCCRP and Schemes identified ([link removed]) a Russian prison medic nicknamed “Dr. Evil” by former detainees, and shed light on the routine denial of treatment, beatings, and humiliation meted out against POWs.

Read the full story → ([link removed])


** Iranian Authorities Accused of Demanding Payment to Hand Over Bodies of Protesters
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As Iranians grabbed rare access to the internet amid a wider blackout, grave allegations began to emerge about the brutal crackdown against nationwide protests that have left thousands dead — including claims that authorities demanded families pay to retrieve the bodies of their relatives.

One participant of a group chat viewed by OCCRP described seeing “endless dead bodies” in a local hospital. They alleged that security forces had targeted “the eyes, hearts, and genitals” of protesters with live rounds.

One person said authorities were demanding that grieving families pay 800 million tomans ($5,200) or more for “bullet fees” in exchange for “handing over the dead bodies” of protesters. Funeral ceremonies are also being banned, they alleged.

Another told OCCRP they had spoken to the family of a young woman who was killed by a “shot in the throat” on her way home from work. Her body was then released without charge because authorities deemed she was a bystander rather than a protester.

Earlier this week, the U.S.-based Iranian advocacy group Human Rights Activists News Agency reported 4,519 verified deaths, with 9,049 additional cases “under investigation.” The Norway-based group Iran Human Rights has cited estimates that place the death toll between 5,000 and 20,000 protesters.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei acknowledged last week that “several thousand people” had been killed.

Read the full story → ([link removed])


** US Sanctions Iranian Security Officials Over Crackdown
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The United States has imposed ([link removed]) sanctions on five individuals linked to the brutal crackdown on protests, including Ali Larijani, the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, and four regional commanders from the Law Enforcement Forces and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

Separately, sanctions were also applied to 18 individuals and firms accused of operating “shadow banking” networks alleged to have helped move Iranian oil revenue through front companies in Iran, the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, and the United Kingdom.


** Jordan Used Israeli Tech to Crack Phones of Gaza War Protesters: Report
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Israeli-made spyware has been used to extract data from the phones of activists and journalists detained in Jordan, according to a new research report from The Citizen Lab and court records viewed by OCCRP.

The tool, made by Israeli company Cellebrite DI Ltd., was used by Jordanian law enforcement to access data from the phones of activists and journalists.

The phones analyzed by Citizen Lab were seized “in the context of protests” against Israel’s Gaza offensive, which followed Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel.

Court records seen by OCCRP show how Jordanian police used the tool to gain access to information including passwords, app data, images, and documents.

"I felt wronged and violated, like they stole something from me," one person who faced interrogation for participating in protests told OCCRP, on condition of anonymity.

Another activist, who was detained after he posted expressing solidarity with Palestinian victims of Israeli bombardment and criticizing Arab states’ Israel policies, said it “plunged [him] into a cycle of pathological self-censorship.”

Read the full story → ([link removed])


** News Briefs
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* As U.S. President Donald Trump makes headlines with his vow to acquire Greenland, a handful of his former employees and staffers have been pursuing ([link removed]) business interests involving the Arctic territory.
* A Ukrainian court has sentenced ([link removed]) a man to 15 years in prison for treason, for working to recruit fighters to the Russian state-funded mercenary outfit Wagner Group.
* Nepal’s Supreme Court has ordered ([link removed]) the government to explain its decision to withdraw charges against the country’s former home minister, who had been accused of money laundering and organized crime.
* Ukraine’s European Solidarity opposition faction will seek ([link removed]) the early dissolution of a temporary investigative commission into corruption created last year, alleging it has become “a mechanism for political pressure.”
* A Dutch court has sentenced ([link removed]) a man to seven years in prison for helping drug traffickers hack into a computer system, involvement in the import of cocaine to the Netherlands, and extortion.
* Chinese authorities imposed ([link removed]) "disciplinary” measures on 983,000 people in more than 1 million corruption cases last year, according to new figures released by the country’s top anti-corruption body.
* Georgian security services are investigating ([link removed]) an alleged “cyberattack” after journalists reported on a decree posted publicly on a government website, which contained confidential details about gas purchases from Russia’s Gazprom.
* At least 330 journalists remained behind bars worldwide in 2025, according to a new report ([link removed]) from the Committee to Protect Journalists.


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** OCCRP Video
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A leaked video posted anonymously on X earlier this month has caused a major political corruption scandal for the presidency of Nikos Christodoulides in Cyprus, with his wife and brother-in-law resigning from public roles.
Journalist Christodoulos Mavroudis explains ([link removed]) what we know about the scandal so far.


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** Opportunities
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Turn your reporting into an interactive game!
Submissions are open for the second Floodlight Gaming Investigative Journalism Game Jam.

We want to help turn your investigative journalism into interactive, in-browser games developed in collaboration with independent game creators.

Submit your application ([link removed]) by February 15.

We’ll announce selected stories on March 15, share them with game developers, and choose the winning games at the Indigo Festival in Rotterdam on June 2-3.
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