US bans entry of Xinjiang cotton products, tomatoes over forced labor claims

The move is the latest in a string where the US is raising pressure on China over some companies’ alleged ill-treatment of workers.

The US will bar entry of all cotton products and tomatoes from China’s Xinjiang region, where it says Beijing is oppressing Muslim-minority Uighurs.

This photo taken on 14 October, 2018 shows farmers picking cotton in a field in Hami in China’s northwestern Xinjiang region. (Bloomberg/ File photo)

The move is the latest in a string where the US is raising pressure on China over some companies’ alleged ill-treatment of workers. The US says the Chinese government has detained more than 1 million Uighurs and other ethnic and religious minorities in “re-education” internment camps, allegations that the Foreign Ministry in Beijing denies.

“Forced labor is a form of modern slavery,” Acting Department of Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Kenneth Cuccinelli said on a call with reporters Wednesday. “‘Made in China’ doesn’t just indicate country of origin -- it’s a warning label.”

The US imported $9 billion of cotton products in the past year and $10 million of tomatoes from China, Brenda Smith, the executive assistant commissioner in the office for trade at Customs and Border Protection, said on the call.

In September, CBP said it planned a so-called withhold release order, or WRO, covering all cotton, textile and tomato products from the country’s northwestern Xinjiang region. CBP has already issued WROs against three Xinjiang-based hair-product and garment producers in 2020 and plans six more in addition to the blanket Xinjiang order.

President-elect Joe Biden has labeled China’s mass detention and re-education program for Xinjiang’s Uighur minority as “genocide” and called for an international effort to make a united stand against the campaign.