Since last Thursday (March 25), there has been a small wave of popular boycott of H&M, Nike, Adidas and many other international apparel brands in China. At first glance, it looks like the Boxer Rebellion is back and the Chinese are boycotting foreign goods again.
So many people have called on the Chinese government not to let this wave of civil boycotts go: it would be detrimental to China’s international image and to its own economic interests.
I think this concern is superfluous. The Chinese government is not going to “let” this wave of boycotts go, because it is the one that started it in the first place. Last Wednesday (March 24), the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League dug up an old statement issued by H&M last year to stop using Xinjiang cotton on its official Weibo account, slamming the Swedish brand for “trying to make money in China while making rumors about boycotting Xinjiang cotton? Delusional!” It was this microblog from the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League that sparked a small wave of support from more than 400,000 netizens and a boycott of H&M and other goods. It is clear that this wave of boycott is not a spontaneous action of the private sector, but is planned and instigated by the authorities.
So, does it mean that the authorities are boycotting foreign goods? Not really. On Monday (March 29), Xu Guixiang, spokesman for the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region People’s Government, responded to the actions of H&M and other brands at a press conference. He said that the stick of sanctions wielded against other countries will also hit their own heads, which is detrimental to others, H&M and other companies should engage in their own business activities, and should not politicize economic behavior.
These words of Xu Guisang made the intention of the authorities to instigate a boycott wave very clear. The boycott wave means: you do not buy our Xinjiang cotton, we will not buy your products. You boycott us, we are bound to boycott you. In the end, it is the interests of both sides will be damaged, your approach is detrimental to others rather than self-interest. The implication is to advise H & M and other companies to give up the boycott of China’s Xinjiang cotton.
We know that H&M and other companies are boycotting China’s Xinjiang cotton because there is forced labor in the production of cotton in Xinjiang, which violates the human rights principles that these companies have pledged to abide by, and also violates the relevant World Trade Organization conventions on the prohibition of forced labor. Xu Guisang said, H & M and other companies should engage in their own business activities, should not be politicized economic behavior. By “not politicizing economic behavior,” it means that H&M and other companies should not link business with human rights issues. But this meaning cannot be explicitly stated, because China is also a member of the World Trade Organization, and the Chinese government has also committed to prohibit forced labor. So then Xu Guixiang added that there is no forced labor in Xinjiang cotton.
The question then boils down to whether there is forced labor in cotton production in Xinjiang.
We know that the judgment that there is forced labor in cotton production in Xinjiang was not made by companies like H&M, nor by the U.S. government or any other Western government, but by a private organization called the Better Cotton Initiative in Switzerland. It was made by a private organization called “Better Cotton Initiative” (Good Cotton Initiative) in Switzerland in the previous year, 2019. As a third party, the “Good Cotton Initiative” enjoys a high degree of credibility, and companies such as H&M are members of the “Good Cotton Initiative”. They are based on the judgment of the “Good Cotton Association”, and thus take a boycott of Xinjiang cotton.
On March 1, an important statement by a public WeChat number certified as “Good Cotton Association Shanghai Representative Office” appeared online in China, which said. “The Good Cotton Association China project team has strictly followed the Good Cotton Association’s auditing principles and has conducted second-party credibility audits and third-party verifications of Xinjiang project sites since 2012, and “has never On March 28, the Chinese Communist Party‘s Global Network published an article entitled “Exclusive Exposure: How the U.S. Manipulates the Issue of “Forced Labor” to Suppress Chinese Cotton Enterprises,” which said that the U.S. and Western anti-China forces forced the Good Cotton Association “headquarters to take sides, resulting in the “Good Cotton Association” admitted that there is a “forced labor risk” in the cotton textile industry in Xinjiang, and ultimately decided to suspend indefinitely the license of “Good Cotton ” certification.
In an interview on March 28, UN Secretary-General Guterres said the UN was in “serious talks” with China to gain unrestricted access to Xinjiang to investigate and verify the persecution of Uighurs and other minorities, including forced labor. The Chinese government has responded that it welcomes a UN visit to Xinjiang but does not want a presumption of guilt.
Will a UN investigation be possible? And if so, what will it reveal? We’ll have to wait and see. But in fact, this issue has been clear for a long Time, when the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying responded to reporters on whether there is forced labor in Xinjiang’s cotton production, showing photos of American black slaves forced to pick cotton; when Xu Guixiang responded to H&M and other companies boycotting Xinjiang cotton because there is forced labor in Xinjiang cotton production, saying that economic behavior should not be politicized. They have not, in fact, not fight themselves?
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