US reintroduces bill to ban forced-labour products from Xinjiang
Al JazeeraThe bill allows the United States to take action against goods produced with forced labour and will allow President Joe Biden’s administration to sanction traffickers of Uighurs and other Muslim minorities. The United States House of Representatives on Thursday reintroduced a bipartisan bill that would ban imports from China’s Xinjiang region unless it is certified they are not produced with forced labour and allow further sanctions against Chinese officials responsible for abuses against Muslims. The House bill would authorise the US president to apply sanctions against anyone responsible for labour trafficking of minority Uighurs or other Muslims in Xinjiang, a leading producer of cotton and cotton products. He charged that the Xinjiang economy was “built upon a foundation of forced labour and repression.” “Many US, international, and Chinese corporations are complicit in the exploitation of forced labour and these products continue to make their way into global supply chains and our country. “I think it’s disgraceful that some corporate leaders in America have spent the last year lobbying against sanctions on Chinese officials for using slave labour in Xinjiang province, and they don’t want to have accountability for their own supply chains in China,” Cotton said during an event on a new report he released about countering China.