China denies forced labour in Xinjiang

Beijing, Sept. 23: China on Tuesday lashed out at the passage of a bill by the U.S. House of Representatives that threatens sanctions over the alleged use of forced labour in China’s Xinjiang region, calling the accusation a lie.

Foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said the bill “maliciously slandered the human rights situation in Xinjiang” and sought to curb development and progress in the region while stirring up ethnic divisions and interfering in China's internal affairs. “The so-called problem of forced labor is totally a lie fabricated by some organisations and personnel in the United States and the West,” he told reporters at a daily briefing.

The House voted 406-3 to declare that any goods produced in Xinjiang are presumptively made with the forced labour of detained Uighurs and other ethnic minorities, and therefore banned from being imported to the US. If enacted into law, it could force companies to avoid a region that products 80% of the cotton in China, one of the world's top producers of the fiber, as well as tomatoes and manufactured goods. —