Rights groups on Wednesday announced that they had filed a new complaint in France against clothing giants including Uniqlo and Zara owner Inditex for allegedly profiting from forced labor of the Uighur minority in China.
The complaint, filed on Tuesday, includes allegations of crimes against humanity, aggravated reduction to servitude, genocide and human trafficking.
The companies denied using forced labor in their supply chains.
Photo: AFP
The complaint was filed by anti-corruption association Sherpa, the Ethique sur l’etiquette (Ethics on Labels) collective, the European Uyghur Institute and a Uighur woman who had been held in a camp in China’s far west region of Xinjiang.
An investigating judge is expected to be appointed in response to the filing.
The complainants say they want to bring to light “the possible responsibilities of clothing multinationals who profit from the forced labor of Uighurs for the production of their products,” particularly cotton items.
A previous case filed to the national anti-terror prosecutor’s office in Paris, which looks into purported crimes against humanity, was dropped last month because it lacks “jurisdiction to prosecute the facts contained in the complaint.”
They had accused Uniqlo France, a subsidiary of Fast Retailing, along with Inditex, the Spanish owner of Zara and other brands, the French fashion group SMCP, and footwear manufacturer Skechers of marketing products that were manufactured at least in part at factories where Uighurs are subjected to forced labor, rights groups said.
The plaintiffs believe the companies do not have sufficient control over their subcontractors.
In addition to the four companies, other major brands, such as Nike, have faced similar accusations.
Rights groups say more than 1 million Uighurs and other mostly Muslim minorities have been held in re-education camps in Xinjiang, with a slew of abuses that include forced labor.
Beijing denies the accusations, describing the facilities as vocational centers designed to curb extremism.
Inditex said the latest accusations were “unfounded.”
“The company has rigorous traceability controls to ensure the provenance of its products and a zero-tolerance policy towards any kind of forced labor,” Inditex said.
Fast Retailing said it had not been notified by the authorities, but that, if and when it happens, it “will cooperate fully with the investigation to reaffirm there is no forced labor in our supply chains.”
SMCP said it had “already denied with the greatest firmness these accusations.”
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered
Former US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi said if US President Joe Biden had ended his re-election bid sooner, the Democratic Party could have held a competitive nominating process to choose his replacement. “Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said in an interview on Thursday published by the New York Times the next day. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said. Pelosi said she thought the Democratic candidate, US Vice President Kamala Harris, “would have done
Farmer Liu Bingyong used to make a tidy profit selling milk but is now leaking cash — hit by a dairy sector crisis that embodies several of China’s economic woes. Milk is not a traditional mainstay of Chinese diets, but the Chinese government has long pushed people to drink more, citing its health benefits. The country has expanded its dairy production capacity and imported vast numbers of cattle in recent years as Beijing pursues food self-sufficiency. However, chronically low consumption has left the market sloshing with unwanted milk — driving down prices and pushing farmers to the brink — while
RSS