On Thursday, the US sanctioned several Chinese tech firms and research institutes by adding them to a Commerce Department export blacklist.
The blacklist prevents anyone in the US from doing business with the Chinese firms unless they obtain a waiver. The Commerce Department said the firms were being targeted for their alleged role in the surveillance of ethnic Uyghurs in Xinjiang.
Also on Thursday, the Senate unanimously passed a bill that would ban all imports from Xinjiang over allegations of forced labor. The legislation, known as the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, was passed by the House on Tuesday and now needs President Biden’s signature to become law. The White House said Biden “welcomed” the legislation, signaling the president will sign the bill once it reaches his desk.
The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act would create a presumption that all goods produced in Xinjiang are made with forced labor. Any US company that seeks to continue business in the region must provide “clear and convincing evidence” that their supply chain is free of such goods. The bill also paves the way for new sanctions on Chinese officials and entities.
Major US corporations lobbied to weaken the bill, including Nike and Coca-Cola. The companies rejected the accusations of forced labor, and Coca-Cola said it uses third-party auditors to inspect factories in the region. The main report linking US firms to forced labor came from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, a think tank that is funded in part by the Australian Department of Defense, the Pentagon, Boeing, and Lockheed Martin.
For the USA to keep on with punishing this alleged atrocious behavior of China surely merits investigation. All the “independent reports” notably from ASPI, an Australian “thinktank” of neocons, when you follow the trail, come from Adrian Zenz, ONE “German scholar,” evangelical Christian, fanatically anti-communist activist who has NEVER been to China, and gathers members of ETIM (Turk-based group formerly considered terrorists by the USA, which has caused many attacks and deaths in China) plus dissident Uighurs collectively called the World Uighur Congress.
Anyone wanting to visit Xinjiang is allowed to, and there are many YOUTUBE videos of life there. Somehow this forced labor/genocide story has convinced many people, even 100% of the “US Senate”, to ignore all the problems the USA now faces, to pile more punishment on a part of China which (coincidentally, of course!) happens to be just at a vital connection point for the very important Belt and Road Initiative linking many countries in constructive, not warlike projects, which the USA just happens to want to destroy.