Detainees sitting within a Uyghur re-education camp in Xinjiang, China.

During Senate confirmation hearings this week, Commerce Secretary nominee Gina Raimondo remarked that the U.S. needs to take a “whole-of-government response” in fighting China’s unfair trade practices. Key to these efforts is the Commerce Department’s powerful Entity List, which targets and bans foreign companies involved in malign activities.

In a New York Times op-ed, Hudson fellow Nury Turkel explains why these efforts matter. An ethnic Uighur, Nury grew up in a Chinese "re-education camp" and witnessed firsthand the abuses committed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) against the Uighur minority. He describes the forced use of Uighur labor to manufacture products that are in many American homes today, and the critical role of U.S. companies in confronting "one of the largest, most systematic persecutions of an ethno-religious group since World War II." 

The Biden administration's foreign policy team has sent strong early signals that it intends to stand up to China, notes Walter Russell Mead in the Wall Street Journal. But the real question is whether the administration will keep up the pressure on issues including the Uighur genocide when faced with conflicting political priorities. Be sure to check out Walter's latest column and read key takeaways from Nury below.

Key Takeaways

Key quotes from Nury Turkel's New York Times op-ed, "I Grew Up Witnessing Forced Labor. U.S. Companies Must Step Up."
 

1. Forced labor products by Uighurs are in American homes:

Dozens of Chinese and international companies — including iconic American brands like Dell, Nike and Heinz — either directly employ or source from businesses that use Uighur forced labor [according to independent research conducted last year by the U.S. Congressional-Executive Commission on China and the Australian Strategy Policy Institute]. Because of the pervasive nature of the use of forced labor in and from the Uighur region, U.S. companies’ exposure to such atrocities in their supply chains is most likely extensive.

2. The U.S. is driving the use of forced labor products:

Exports from the Uighur region to the United States continue to rise, raising concerns about the increasing magnitude of the problem. From April 2019 to April 2020, the United States was the fastest-growing export market for the Uighur region, rising by more than 250 percent and including many industries, such as apparel, wigs, metals and plastic.

3. China's "vocational training centers" are actually brutal prisons:

Re-education camps and forced labor remain a gruesome reality for millions of Uighurs and other Turkic Muslims in East Turkistan, which China calls the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region. These camps, known as “vocational training centers,” are far from vocational and never voluntary. Detainees suffer torture, rape, forced sterilization and abortion, constant political indoctrination and even death. 

4. Current legislation before Congress is a step in the right direction:

Products made using Uighur forced labor — including wigs, face masks, apparel and electronics — have made their way to the United States, violating U.S. laws and regulations. In response, the House passed the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act with bipartisan support in September 2020, which bans the import of goods made in Xinjiang using forced labor, imposes sanctions on foreign individuals and entities who engage in this practice and requires companies to disclose information related to Xinjiang.

5. Third party work audits used by U.S. companies are often deceived:

Audits alone do not provide reliable and sufficient information to detect labor abuses in the supply chains. Because of the extremely repressive environment in the Uighur region, authorities have prevented auditors from carrying out their work with undue interference....As a case in point, Nike claimed that an audit confirmed that its Qingdao factory had no Uighur workers in 2019. However, citing Chinese state media, ASPI reported that the factory still employed about 800 Uighurs at the end of 2019 and produced more than seven million pairs of shoes for Nike each year.

6. U.S. companies must look for indicators of forced labor in their supply chains:

U.S. companies must actively and independently look for potential indicators of forced labor in the supply chains, including: a lack of transparency on the origin of goods; Xinjiang-based suppliers with high revenue but few employees paying into social insurance programs; use of internment terminologies such as “Education Training Centers” or “Legal Education Centers”; government incentives for “poverty alleviation” and “mutual pairing programs”; workers hired through government recruiters; and factory locations that may be indicative of forced labor.

Go Deeper: The CCP's Human Rights Abuses