Britain prevents Xinjiang labor camps, accusing China of “torture”

LONDON – The UK has introduced new measures to eliminate the presence of alleged forced labor in the Chinese region of Xinjiang in the British supply chains.

China is accused of extrajudicially detaining more than 1 million Uighur Muslims and other minorities in political re-education camps in the northwestern autonomous region, along with invasive surveillance, restrictions on Uyghur culture and the use of forced labor.

China strongly denies the allegations, saying the centers are aimed at combating extremism and encouraging the development of professional skills.

Companies with an annual turnover of over £ 36 million ($ 49.2 million) that fail to demonstrate proper due diligence to ensure that their supply chains are free of forced labor under Modern Slavery The act will now be subject to fines, British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab announced in the House of Commons on Tuesday.

“We need to make sure that UK businesses are not part of the supply chains that lead to the gates of Xinjiang’s internment camps and make sure that the products of human rights violations that take place in these camps do not end up on supermarket shelves that they we buy here at home, week by week, “Raab said.

The government will also initiate an urgent review of export controls to prevent exports that could help human rights abuses, issue new guidelines to companies operating in the region, and extend the modern Public Slavery Law to any public sector. companies that showed that they forced labor ties from public procurement contracts.

Raab claimed the evidence was now “far-reaching” and “gave a really terrible picture”, accusing China of operating “internment camps, arbitrary detention, political re-education, forced labor, torture and forced sterilization, all on an industrial scale”. .

“It’s really horrible – the barbarism we hoped was lost in another era, which is practiced today, while we are talking about one of the leading members of the international community,” he added.

Raab cited reports from diplomats and escaped victims, satellite images showing factories in internment camps and the destruction of mosques, and reports from third parties from the UN Commission on Human Rights, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.

A spokesman for the Chinese embassy in London did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.

Raab stressed that China’s refusal to allow access to a UN human rights commissioner or other credible foreign authority was not compatible with these claims.

“China cannot simply deny any access to those trusted third-party bodies that could verify the facts and at the same time maintain a credible denial position,” he added.

Raab’s measures have stopped sanctioning individual Chinese officials for their involvement in the alleged atrocities, and Shadow Foreign Secretary Lisa Nandy has argued that her counterpart has not gone far enough, likening Raab’s actions to “quarreling around the edges.” .

The presence of forced labor in international supply chains has been the target of a number of important governments in recent years. At the end of 2020, several US companies were set on fire for alleged lobbying to weaken a bipartisan bill banning imports from Xinjiang.

“Some American politicians have invented misinformation of the so-called ‘labor force’ to restrict and suppress relevant Chinese parties and businesses, as well as to contain China’s development,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hua Chunying told CNBC in December.

“All ethnic groups in Xinjiang choose their occupations of their own free will and sign ’employment contracts’ of their own free will in accordance with the law on an equal basis.”