China wants Philippines to stop all forms of online gambling, as it continues cracking down on a practice it says causes illegal outflow of money.

While China appreciates the move to halt the issuance of new licenses, “we hope the Philippines will go further and ban all online gambling,” China’s foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said, according to the transcript of his Aug. 20 briefing posted on the website of its Philippine embassy.

The comments are the latest signal that China is mounting pressure on Southeast Asian nations in its effort to stamp out online gambling which it says causes hundreds of millions of yuan to illegally flow out of its economy. Online and phone betting has exploded in countries such as the Philippines and Cambodia over the last few years due to demand from gamblers in mainland China.

The Philippine gaming regulator said on Monday that it won’t halt existing online casinos but will stop accepting applications for new licenses at least until the end of the year to review concerns about the burgeoning sector. Chinese state news agency Xinhua reported on Sunday that Cambodia’s Prime Minister Hun Sen has ordered a stop on new licenses for online gambling operations. Existing licenses won’t be renewed upon expiry, said the report.