CHINA’S TREATMENT OF UIGHUR MUSLIMS “BARBARISM”: UK

Wed 13 January 2021:

The United Kingdom has accused China of human rights violations amounting to “barbarism” against its Uighur minority, as it announced, on Tuesday, new rules to ban imports of goods suspected of using forced labour.

The abuses were “on an industrial scale”, said foreign secretary Dominic Raab, in strongly-worded comments that will do little to improve ties with Beijing strained by its crackdown in Hong Kong.

“It is truly horrific barbarism we had hoped lost to another era, in practice today as we speak, in one of the leading members of the international community,” he told Parliament.

“We have a moral duty to respond.”

Raab outlined plans to bar British companies which inadvertently or deliberately profit from, or contribute to, human rights violations against the Uighurs in Xinjiang province, northwest China.

The measures included a strengthening of the UK’s Modern Slavery Act to introduce fines for businesses not complying with transparency rules, extending the act to the public sector, and an “urgent review” of export controls around Xinjiang.

Canada joined the UK on Tuesday in announcing limits on imports from Xinjiang, saying it was “deeply concerned” about the “mistreatment of Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities by Chinese authorities” in a written statement.

Canadian Minister of Foreign Affairs Francois-Philippe Champagne said in the statement “Nobody should face mistreatment on the basis of their religion or ethnicity. Together with the UK, we are taking action to ensure we are not complicit in the abuse of the Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang.”

Ottawa will advance measures to block products produced by forced labour, including studies on forced labour and offering “advanced advice to Canadian companies”, the statement said.

Raab told members of Parliament that action had to be taken to “make sure that UK businesses are not part of the supply chains that lead to the gates of the internment camps in Xinjiang”.

The government needed to ensure that “the products of the human rights violations that take place in those camps don’t end up on the shelves of supermarkets that we shop in here at home week in, week out”, he added.

British retailer Marks and Spencer promised last week not to use cotton from Xinjiang, as concern grows in the fashion industry about their supply chains.

International human rights groups have documented mounting evidence of forced labour, as well as forced sterilisations, torture, surveillance, and the repression of Uighur culture.

According to experts, at least one million Uighurs have been detained in recent years in political “re-education camps” in the huge region of China that borders Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Beijing has dismissed these charges, saying it is operating vocational training centres to counter what it views as “Islamist radicalism” following a series of attacks it attributed to the Muslim group.

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