NCCM Calls on the Canadian Government to Ban the Importation of Goods Made From Uyghur Forced Labour in East Turkestan (Xinjiang)

(Toronto – February 4, 2022) 

As the international community arrives in Beijing for the 2022 Winter Olympics, global attention on the games must not eclipse efforts by human rights defenders to focus international attention on China’s well-known human rights abuses.   

Among these issues is Beijing’s ongoing mistreatment of the Uyghur minority in the Uyghur region of China, including the subjecting of interned individuals to forced labour. The National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM) is calling on the Canadian government to ramp up efforts to ban the import of goods stemming from forced Uyghur labour in China. 

The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) human rights abuses aimed at Uyghur communities in the Uyghur region are widespread and systematic.The forced assimilation of Uyghur Muslims is amounting to what human rights groups now see as ethnic cleansing and genocide. 

According to Amnesty International, this has involved the internment of Uyghurs in nearly 1,200 camps, and cases of forced labour under the threat of physical violence, sexual abuse and torture. Forced labour conditions include restrictions on the movement of laborers, debt bondage, constant digital surveillance, forced isolation, forced sterilization, abusive working conditions, and the withholding of wages, according to the U.S. Department of State.  

“We are calling on the Canadian government to do the right thing and end the import of goods made from forced labour. Canada cannot stand by while millions of Uyghurs are forcibly detained, tortured and abused. Goods from forced labour are widely available in many Canadian stores. Canada has the power to ban and embargo the import of these goods and products resulting from forced Uyghur labour in East Turkestan (Xinjiang). We cannot be bystanders to genocide and ethnic cleansing,” says Dr. Siham Rayale, Director of Foreign Affairs at NCCM.   

 NOTE TO EDITORS:  

Amnesty International’s recent reporting on Uyghur detention camps can be found here: https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2021/06/china-draconian-repression-of-muslims-in-xinjiang-amounts-to-crimes-against-humanity/