Letter to the G7 leaders on combating Uyghur forced labour
June 23, 2022
Dear leaders of the G7,
We, members and supporters of the Coalition to End Forced Labour in the Uyghur Region, are writing to you in advance of the G7 annual Leaders’ Summit on 26-28 June to urge the adoption of concrete measures to combat forced labour and other grave human rights violations against Uyghurs and other Turkic and Muslim majority peoples of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (Uyghur Region), perpetrated by the government of China.
Our coalition comprises more than 400 civil society organisations and trade unions from over 40 countries united to end state-sponsored forced labour and other egregious abuses against people from the Uyghur Region. We call on leading companies across supply chains to ensure that they do not support or benefit from systematic, state-sponsored forced labour of Uyghurs both in the Uyghur Region and across China through coercive labour transfers, and on governments to take action.
We welcome your commitment, as articulated in the G7 Foreign Ministers’ communiqué of 14 May, to “tackle instances of forced labour,” including through domestic means. We urge you to make meaningful this commitment through the adoption and robust enforcement of import control mechanisms to stop the flood of goods tainted with Uyghur forced labour from entering your markets, an approach endorsed in the communiqué of the 24 May G7 Employment Ministerial Meeting.
This year, the International Labour Organization registered its deep concern with regard to evidence of the systematic repression of Uyghurs, and subsequently deplored this fact at its annual conference. Researchers, journalists, and survivors have credibly documented the use of Uyghur forced labour in numerous global supply chains, including garment and textile, chemical, pharmaceutical, automotive, and agricultural. These goods and inputs are sold to consumers around the world. Nearly twenty percent of the world’s cotton is produced in the Uyghur Region, as well as forty-five percent of the world’s solar-grade polysilicon, which is necessary for solar panel production, and twenty-five percent of the world’s tomato paste, to name just a few examples.
Pervasive surveillance and repression make credible third-party audits impossible in the Uyghur Region. Companies must be required to map and disclose their supply chains down to the raw material level and cut ties with any supplier using Uyghur forced labour. Governments must stop these goods from entering their markets. Global alignment is crucial for import control measures targeting forced labour goods to be effective.
The US Uyghur Forced Labour Prevention Act (UFLPA) takes effect on 21 June. The law establishes the rebuttable presumption that any good made in whole or in part in the Uyghur Region or using Uyghur transported labour is made with forced labour and prohibited from entering US commerce. Forced labour import measures are also being considered in Canada and Australia. The EU has issued a Call for Evidence in advance of publishing its proposal for an EU legislative instrument to effectively ban products made by forced labour from entering the EU market. The UK has introduced a proposal to ban forced labour products in public healthcare supply chains. As noted by G7 Employment Ministers in the communiqué, “this momentum offers an opportunity: to ensure coherence in regulatory measures taken at the national level, provide legal clarity to business, reduce compliance costs for companies and, most importantly, prevent business involvement with harms to people and planet in the first instance, and enable access to effective remedy wherever they occur.”
As stewards of some of the world’s largest economies, we call on you to take clear action, in line with your commitments, to introduce legislation to stop goods made with Uyghur forced labour from entering your markets, to share data necessary for robust enforcement of these measures, and to hold accountable corporations which fail to take meaningful action to remove Uyghur forced labour from their supply chains.
Sincerely,
A Single Thread CIC // Sustainable Fashion Week
AFL-CIO
Anti-Slavery International
Aquinas Associates
Arise Foundation
ASTRA-Anti trafficking Action
Australian Uyghur Association
Australian Uyghur Tangritagh Women’s Association
Be Slavery Free
Befria HongKong
Belgium Uyghur Association
Birmingham Progressive Synagogue
Board of Deputies of British Jews
Campaign For Uyghurs
CCC Germany (Kampagne für Saubere Kleidung)
Center for Uyghur Studies
China Aid Association
Collectif Ethique sur l’étiquette
CoMensha, the Dutch Coordination Center against human trafficking
Comitato Lady Lawyer Village
Comite de Apoyo al Tíbet (CAT) Spain
Conference of Liberal Rabbis and Cantors
Coordination des Associations et des Particuliers pour la Liberté de Conscience
Corporate Accountability Lab
Cortez Church of the Nazarene
Cotton Campaign
Crane Center for Mass Atrocity Prevention
Dana Investment Advisors
Dark Bali
Dominican Sisters ~ Grand Rapids
Dutch Uyghur human rights foundation
Emgage Action
Environmental Justice Foundation
European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR)
European Sex Workers’ Rights Alliance (ESWA)
Fair
FAIRWORK Belgium
Fashion Revolution
Fashion Roundtable
FEMNET
FIDU – Italian Federation for Human Rights
Finchley Progressive Synagogue
Focus on Labour Exploitation
Free Uyghur Now
Freedom Collaborative
Freedom United
Global Labor Justice-International Labor Rights Forum
Global Legal Action Network
Global Student Forum
Grupo de Apoio ao Tibete-Portugal
Homeworkers Worldwide
Hong Kong Committee in Norway
Hong Kong Forum, Los Angeles
HopeNow
Human Resource Development Foundation
Human Rights Foundation
Human Rights Watch
Humanitarian China
Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility
IlhamTohti Initiative e.V.
Indonesia Save Uyghur
Investor Alliance for Human Rights
İsa Yusuf Alptekin Foundation
Jewish Movement For Uyghur Freedom
Jewish World Watch
La Strada International
Labour Behind the Label
Lady Lawyer Fashion Archive
Lady Lawyer Foundation
London Mining Network
Louise Xin Couture
Malaysia4Uyghur
Malaysian Consultative Council of Islamic Organizations
Nisa Nashim West Midlands
No Business With Genocide
Northwest Coalition for Responsible Investment
Norwegian Uyghur Committee
Open Gate – La Strada N. Macedonia
Prickly Thistle Scotland Ltd
Remake
René Cassin, the Jewish voice for human rights
Responsible Sourcing Network
Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth
Sisters of St. Dominic of Blauvelt, New York
Society for Threatened Peoples
Stop Uyghur Genocide Australia
Stop Uyghur Genocide UK
Sydney Network for Democracy in China
The Human Trafficking Legal Center
The International Women’s Alliance for Family Institution and Quality Education (WAFIQ)
The Peace Project
The Right Project
The Sustainable Angle & Future Fabrics Expo
Tibet Initiative Deutschland e.V.
Uyghur American Association
Uyghur Association of Victoria, Australia
Uyghur Center for Democracy and Human Rights
Uyghur Freedom Forum
Uyghur Human Rights Project
Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project
Uzbek Forum for Human Rights
“Vatra” Psycho – Social Centre , Albania
Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation
Worker Rights Consortium
World Uyghur Congress
Letter to the G7 leaders on combating Uyghur forced labour
Photo credit: “G7 Summit flags” by UK Prime Minister is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.