German companies will be forced to leave Xinjiang after the implementation of a new supply chain law, the German parliament said in a report that the Uighurs, China’s ethnic minority, have been subjected to genocide and severe human rights persecution.
The German cabinet passed a draft supply chain law in March that would require companies of a certain size to pay a fine of up to 2 percent of their annual turnover if they ignore human rights violations and environmental pollution by their suppliers. This draft is currently being considered by the parliament.
“The Süddeutsche Zeitung reports that, according to a report by the German parliamentary research department, many foreign companies profit from the exploitation of Uighurs by directly purchasing products made by slave labor or by working with suppliers who employ slave labor.
In addition, some German companies have factories located in close proximity to re-education camps where Uighurs are imprisoned, and major German companies with factories in Xinjiang, such as Adidas, Volkswagen and BASF, are named in the report.
The German parliamentary experts believe that the Chinese government’s treatment of the Uighurs in Xinjiang meets the definition of “genocide” as defined in Article 2 of the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, which states that the Uighurs are being subjected to “genocide.
In light of the severe persecution of human rights there, the report states that the implementation of the supply chain law will inevitably lead German companies to suspend their business activities in Xinjiang and to cut off dealings with suppliers in Xinjiang.
Recently, the Canadian, Dutch and British parliaments passed resolutions condemning the genocide of the Uyghurs in Xinjiang, but the German parliament did not follow suit.
The report clearly points out the responsibility of German companies with operations in Xinjiang, and the German parliament has the responsibility to take action to end the massive and systematic human rights violations in Xinjiang, according to the Green Party MP who commissioned the parliamentary research department to write the report (Margarete Bause).
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