(Washington, DC) – The brand new US compelled labor regulation ought to heighten scrutiny of firm provide chains which are linked to compelled labor in China, Human Rights Watch mentioned at present in a submission to the federal Compelled Labor Enforcement Process Power (FLETF). The regulation must also end in elevated civil and legal penalties for corporations that import merchandise linked to compelled labor.
The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA), signed into law by President Joe Biden in December 2021, creates a presumption that items made in complete or partially in China’s northwest Xinjiang area, or produced by entities in China linked to compelled labor, can’t be imported into the USA. Since 2017, China has detained as many as a million Uyghurs and different Turkic Muslims in Xinjiang and subjected them to varied abuses that quantity to crimes against humanity, together with subjecting detainees and different Turkic Muslims to compelled labor inside and outdoors Xinjiang.
“The US authorities has a strong new instrument to make sure that corporations should not complicit in compelled labor, however enforcement is every part,” mentioned Jim Wormington, senior enterprise and human rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The federal government ought to require importers to reveal their provide chains to establish hyperlinks to Xinjiang or different compelled labor websites, and may maintain corporations accountable the place they or their suppliers proceed to use compelled labor.”
The multiagency taskforce chaired by the Division of Homeland Safety on January 24, 2022, requested input into the technique the US authorities ought to use to implement the brand new compelled labor regulation. The regulation builds on current US laws, the 1930 Tariff Act, which banned the import of “all items, wares, articles, and merchandise mined, produced, or manufactured wholly or partially” by compelled labor. Since 2019, US Customs and Border Safety (CBP) has issued a dozen orders requiring the seizure of sure classes of merchandise from Xinjiang, together with a January 2021 order protecting all cotton and tomato merchandise produced in complete or partially from Xinjiang.
The brand new regulation goes additional by requiring customs officers to use a requirement, scheduled to enter impact on June 21, that presumes that any items “mined, produced, or manufactured wholly or partially” in Xinjiang are produced with compelled labor and so prohibited from entry to the US. The presumption additionally applies to items produced by entities – whether or not in Xinjiang or elsewhere in China – that the US authorities lists as linked to compelled labor.
The brand new regulation states that corporations can rebut the presumption towards imports by offering “clear and convincing proof” that items should not linked to compelled labor. Nevertheless, the extent of Chinese language government surveillance and threats to workers and auditors in Xinjiang at the moment make it not possible for corporations to offer credible proof that they or their suppliers within the area are freed from compelled labor. Even elsewhere in China, the arrests of labor activists, a prohibition on independent trade unions, authorities surveillance, and the Chinese language authorities’s anti-sanctions laws pose severe obstacles to figuring out and remediating the danger of compelled labor and different human rights abuses.
In its submission to the duty power, Human Rights Watch underscored that the best technique to establish Xinjiang-linked items could be to require all manufacturers and retailers importing into the US to map their international provide chains, from uncooked supplies to producers, and disclose them in a time-bound method. The duty power ought to contemplate whether or not imposing this requirement is feasible utilizing current govt powers and, if not, ought to suggest new laws requiring necessary provide chain mapping and disclosure and complete human rights due diligence.
Customs and Border Safety’s personal efforts to establish merchandise from Xinjiang or from entities linked to compelled labor ought to deal with high-risk sectors, together with the precedence sectors (cotton, tomatoes, and polysilicon) recognized within the new regulation itself. Customs officers ought to establish which importers in high-priority sectors are at highest threat of compelled labor hyperlinks and may request data from these corporations on their provide chains and their efforts to establish and deal with compelled labor. If focused importers fail to answer questions, or present insufficient data, Customs and Border Safety ought to view this as proof that the merchandise embody materials from Xinjiang or from entities linked to compelled labor and are barred from import underneath the brand new regulation.
To show that it’s successfully implementing compelled labor import bans, Customs and Border Safety must be clear about its enforcement actions. It ought to disclose when it holds, re-exports, excludes, or seizes items, together with data on the corporate importing the banned items; the character of the products; their approximate worth; and the explanation for the enforcement motion. The US authorities must also impose monetary penalties on corporations for importing or making an attempt to import items linked to compelled labor and make the most of legal guidelines such because the Trafficking Victims Protection Act to criminally prosecute people and companies for his or her roles in imports linked for compelled labor.
“US importers ought to now not be capable to plead ignorance over their hyperlinks to compelled labor in China and the Xinjiang area particularly,” mentioned Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch. “Firms with operations, suppliers, or sub-suppliers in Xinjiang ought to shortly exit the area or threat seeing their items seized on the US border and their companies topic to civil and legal penalties.”
