4 Social Security Fraud Overseas; a not-too-surprising list of countries

This month I turned seventy so I started to collect Social Security.  The Social Security Administration sent me a "What You Need To Know..." booklet (SSA Pub. Num. 05-10077, ICN 468300, dated 3/2013).  A person can usually get the Social Security payment sent to a foreign country but on page 12 was a list of countries where they will not send the payments (it is not clear if that means checks, electronic transfers or both).

The countries are Azerbaijan, Belarus, Cuba, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, North Korea, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan and Vietnam.  The publications say that "exceptions can be made for certain eligible beneficiaries in countries other than Cuba and North Korea".

The list has a few surprises. Cuba and North Vietnam were expected but Iran was overlooked, probably because we don't do bank transfers there at all.  All of the former Soviet republics except for the three EU-member Baltic States are on the banned list- with the exception of Russia and Armenia.  This suggests that Russian banking is trustworthy in a technical sense.  Armenia is a U.S.ally and has a large and politically powerful diaspora living mainly in California and New England.  I suspect there are quite a few U.S. retirees there.  Vietnam is also a bit of a surprise;  we have pretty good relations with the place today.  Is there some sort of fraud associated with the place that I don't understand?  If you have any knowledge, let me know

Except for Cuba and North Korea this appears to be an anti-fraud list.  I'm a bit surprised that Belarus and Ukraine were on the list in 2013.  I'd definitely like to know how the list was created and why.

One other comment.  There is well known and massive Social Security and VA benefits fraud in some places overseas.  The Philippines  is the best known case.  None of the recipients ever dies- they live well past 100.  Basically when people die it is never reported and there is a great deal of pressure on the U.S. from the immigrant communities not to ask for proof that the person is still alive.  This isn't just a U.S. problem.  When the oldest person in Japan died a few years ago the press went to the home of the second oldest... and found the person was long dead.  It turned out that much of the press reports that "many Japanese live to be 100"  were false;  It was really 70 year-olds simply not reporting that the 90 year-old grandma had died so they could keep collecting the modest retirement income..