The United States has expanded its trade blacklist to include three Chinese companies – COFCO Sugar Holding, Sichuan Jingweida Technology Group, and Anhui Xinya New Materials – over concerns of forced labor involving Uyghurs and other minorities in China. The move, which takes effect from December 11, prohibits goods produced by these companies from entering the United States. With these additions, the total number of designated companies under the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act entity list now stands at 30.
The Department of Homeland Security cited the companies’ participation in business practices that target members of persecuted groups, including Uyghur minorities in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). COFCO Sugar Holding is involved in refining and producing sugar, Jingweida Technology manufactures devices such as network transformers and radio frequency filters, and Xinya New Materials produces textile materials.
The U.S. government, along with lawmakers in several other Western countries, has characterized China’s treatment of the Uyghur minority in the Xinjiang region as “genocide,” an accusation strongly denied by Beijing. Human rights groups report that at least one million people, primarily from Muslim minorities, have been detained in the region, facing widespread abuses such as forced sterilization of women and coerced labor.
The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act prohibits the import of all goods from the Xinjiang region unless companies can provide verifiable evidence that production did not involve forced labor. This move is part of a broader effort to address concerns related to human rights abuses and forced labor in supply chains.
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