NGOs and a Uighur survivor filed a complaint in France on Friday April 9 against four multinational clothing companies accused of profiting from forced labor imposed on the Turkish-speaking Muslim minority of Uighurs in China.
Are accused of “Concealment of forced labor and crimes against humanity” the companies Inditex (owner of the Zara brand), Uniqlo, SMCP (Sandro, Maje, de Fursac, etc.) and the sports shoemaker Skechers. This complaint was lodged by the anti-corruption association Sherpa, the Ethics on Etiquette collective, the Uyghur Institute of Europe (IODE) and a Uyghur woman who was interned in the province of Xinjiang. This region in northwestern China accounts for nearly a fifth of global cotton production and supplies many garment giants.
Clothing and footwear made in camps
On the basis of a report published in March 2020 by the Australian NGO Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI, “Australian Strategic Policy Institute”) on the use of forced labor by the Uighur minority, the plaintiffs are asking the French courts to ” investigate those companies that “Would continue to subcontract part of their production there or to market goods using cotton produced in the region, making themselves complicit in the serious crimes perpetrated there”.
The associations believe it is likely that these four companies will market clothing or shoes made in whole or in part in factories where Uighurs are subjected to forced labor. They also believe that they do not justify sufficient efforts to ensure that their subcontractors are not involved in the persecution of this minority. In detail, the complainants suggest that the courts qualify these facts as “Concealment of the crime of reduction in aggravated servitude”, “Concealment of the crime of trafficking in human beings in an organized gang” or “Concealment of the crime of genocide and crimes against humanity”. The complaint, filed in Paris by lawyer William Bourdon, “Is the first of a series which will be deployed in the coming months in other European countries”.
The large Spanish industrial group specializing in the manufacture and distribution of textiles Inditex is criticized by associations for its links with major producers of yarns and fabrics based in Xinjiang, which it contested. Uniqlo, which has officially taken a stand against forced labor by Uighurs, is accused of sourcing textiles in the region, as well as in Anhui province, where thousands of workers have been transferred, possibly forced .
Regarding SMCP, the manufacturer’s majority shareholder Topsoho, a company owned by the Chinese Shandong Ruyi, which, according to ASPI, has established its factories since 2010 in Xinjiang. Finally, Skechers USA France shoes were produced at a factory in Guangdong province, where Uighurs potentially forcibly transferred work, according to the plaintiffs.
The associations announced that they would hold a press conference in Paris on Monday, in the presence of MEP Raphaël Glucksmann, recently banned from China for his commitment to this cause, and sociologist Dilnur Reyhan, founder of the Uighur Institute of ‘Europe.
Several countries, including the United States, cite a “Genocide” of which the Uighurs would be victims. Human rights NGOs accuse Beijing of having interned more than a million of them since 2017 in political re-education centers. A figure denied by the communist regime, which ensures that it is “Vocational training centers” intended to drive the Uighurs away from Islamism and separatism, after a series of attacks attributed to them.