Thread: As Australia mulls ban on Xinjiang-made goods, critics ask why China is being singled

The United States has backed an independent Australian lawmaker's proposal for Canberra to ban the import of all goods made through forced labour in China, including those produced in its westernmost region of Xinjiang, where the United Nations estimates about 1 million Uygur and other Muslim minority citizens are being held against their will in so-called re-education camps.


While China has been accused of subjecting detainees to political indoctrination and forced labour in the camps, Beijing has denied this, insisting that its "vocational education and training centers" respect minorities' religious beliefs and customs, and reduce poverty and violent extremism.


The US State Department, in a submission to an Australian parliamentary committee discussing the draft bill, said it supported the goals of the legislation. Together with Britain and Canada, the US has in recent weeks moved to ban goods that it claims are linked to Uygur forced labour and expressed alarm over testimony from dissidents alleging other human rights violations in the camps, including forced sterilisation, systemic rape and torture.

While numerous groups in Australia - including those advocating for Uygurs - have supported the proposal, others in submissions to the committee have criticised the bill's singling out of China and blanket ban on all goods made in Xinjiang, irrespective of any proven links to forced labour.


Human Rights Watch and the Australian Council of Trade Unions have expressed support for the bill's aims, while suggesting the proposals be expanded to all goods linked to forced labour, regardless of country of origin. India was home to the largest number of people living in modern slavery in 2018, with an estimated 8 million slaves, followed by China, Pakistan, North Korea and Nigeria, according to the Global Slavery Index produced that year by the Walk Free Foundation.


David Brophy, a senior lecturer in modern Chinese history at the University of Sydney, said given the legislation only named China, Beijing would issue a "predictable response" that "this is simply part of a Western campaign to delegitimise it and harm its economy" or "that Australia is only adopting this legislation to keep pace with American sanctions".


"It's essential, I believe, that Australia is able to respond convincingly to such accusations, and demonstrate that its actions reflect a genuine desire to eliminate forced labour from global supply chains," he said. "It's very hard to do that if the legislation only names one country."


The bill, which was introduced in December, is currently being examined by the Senate Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Legislation Committee, which is due to issue its recommendations on the proposals in May. It will need the support of the governing Liberal-National Coalition or main opposition Labor Party before it can be tabled in parliament for a vote.


Although Foreign Minister Marise Payne has publicly raised concerns about conditions in Xinjiang, Canberra has not given any indication that it intends to support the bill.


Independent senator Rex Patrick, who drafted the bill, said he believed there was some bipartisan support for his proposals, though he acknowledged Canberra could be hesitant to further aggravate China-Australia ties, which have sunk to their lowest ebb in decades over the past year.


Patrick said his bill was intended to strengthen enforcement against forced labour and build on the growing international opposition to Beijing's policies in Xinjiang.


"In some sense my bill seeks to act as a catalyst to reinforce what is happening internationally, to give Australia a spoke in the wheel that is directed at dealing with this awful situation that is taking place in Xinjiang," he said.

A source within the Labor Party told This Week in Asia that it was awaiting the outcome of the committee's inquiry before taking a position on the proposals.


"I know that there are Labor senators, I know that there are Liberal senators that support the bill," Patrick said. "Whether or not they can get the bill across the line in their own party rooms is a matter for them. It will all depend on how the support plays out and that's one of the important things in relation to the inquiry."


The Australian Strategic Policy Institute - which is part funded by the Australian, US and British governments - said in a report last year that there was evidence of Uygur forced labour in the supply chains of more than 80 global brands.


Although Australia passed legislation aimed at combating modern slavery in 2018, the current law only requires companies with turnovers of A$100 million (US$77.6 million) or more to publish an annual report outlining the risks of forced labour in their supply chains and proposed remedies, with no penalties for non-compliance.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on Monday has described US and Canadian claims of genocide in Xinjiang as "inflammatory accusations" and "simply malicious and politically driven hype" that had been "fabricated out of ignorance and prejudice".


Canada's House of Commons on Monday overwhelmingly passed a motion that accused China of carrying out genocide in the region, and called for the 2022 Winter Olympics to be moved from Beijing, putting pressure on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Cabinet, who abstained from the vote.


Ottawa's move followed the Trump administration's announcement during its final hours last month that it had determined Beijing was responsible for "genocide and crimes against humanity" in Xinjiang.


Meanwhile, British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab on Monday used his country's return as a voting member at the UN Human Rights Council to call for the body to be granted "urgent and unfettered" access to investigate human rights violations in the region.


This article originally appeared on the South China Morning Post (HK, China, Asia news & opinion from SCMP’s global edition | South China Morning Post), the leading news media reporting on China and Asia.

As Australia mulls ban on Xinjiang-made goods, critics ask why China is being singled out for forced labour

I wish Canada would ban all Chinese products.

Originally Posted by panama hat

Oh, David . . . and you draw your income from where?

You don't actually think he wrote that the use of concentration camps by the chinkies is "justified" because he's trousering chinky cash, do you?

Noooooooooooooo . . .

Originally Posted by OhOh

Is there an agreed definition of "forced labour"

Go fuck yourself

Originally Posted by panama hat

Go fuck yourself

" World News

(7 Viewing)
The forum for posting news events from all over the world, ie America, Australia, Africa, Europe and any where else that isn't in Asia.
Robust discussion is allowed, but posters should stay on topic and refrain from personal attacks."

Originally Posted by OhOh

Robust discussion is allowed, but posters should stay on topic and refrain from personal attacks."

"Robust discussion" is not denying that over a million Uighurs are in concentration camps, so fuck yourself

Originally Posted by OhOh

" World News

(7 Viewing)
The forum for posting news events from all over the world, ie America, Australia, Africa, Europe and any where else that isn't in Asia.
Robust discussion is allowed, but posters should stay on topic and refrain from personal attacks."

You are a snivelling chinky sycophant and to quibble over the definition of a phrase that speaks for itself - "forced labour" - shows the depths you will plumb to support Mr. Shithole and the rest of your chinky heroes.

US exceptionalism surges again. Will it fly?

February 27, 2021 by M. K. BHADRAKUMAR

"In a statement marking the “return” of the United States to the United Nations Human Rights Council on Wednesday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken disclosed that the Biden Administration is placing democracy and human rights at the centre of American foreign policy. The cat is out of the bag. The US is in relative decline and there is resource crunch. There is absence of a positive vision for humanity, as the country struggles with its own demons. The dramatic events in the American society and politics in the recent past badly exposed the country as a sham democracy with an abominable record of racism and appalling inequality where top 0.1 percent of the population hold roughly the same share of the country’s wealth as the bottom 90 percent.

But the resurrection of American exceptionalism will have no takers, and the US, lacking the capacity and the moral authority to advance a unifying agenda in the international arena, is assembling a toolkit for its diplomacy, with geopolitical objectives.

The potential of the UN Human Rights Council ought to be directed at the raging coronavirus pandemic, which has undermined the social and economic foundations of states. The most fundamental human right — the right to life — has been threatened, with the world economic downturn causing a big rise in unemployment and aggravating social insecurity. The development gap between nations and regions is widening.

Yet, the US is in a category by itself even among the rich countries. The Covid-19 deaths per one million inhabitants have gone through the roof in the US in comparison with its own allies — it stands at 328.84 per million in the US as against 83.13 in Germany, 67.06 in France, 66.83 in UK, 61 in Japan. The appalling reality is that in the US the death toll from the COVID-19 epidemic has crossed 500,000.

Ironically, per capita Covid-19 deaths in some of the countries that Blinken berates for deficit in democracy and human rights will put the US to shame — Syria 59.4; Venezuela 0.91; Cuba 2.21; Sri Lanka 1.19. And China with a population of 1400 million registered 4834 deaths.

But for Blinken, such horrific level of deaths among his countrymen isn’t a human rights issue. Not a single state functionary in America has been held responsible for such a tragedy of unspeakable proportions.

Suffice to say, the US is bringing disrepute and shame to the whole western world by leading them into such a cynical game strutting around as champions of human rights when according to a recent estimate, more than half of all vaccines against COVID-19 have been reserved for one-seventh of the world’s population. Isn’t that a matter of human rights?

The UK alone has reportedly secured enough vaccines to give each of its citizens five doses. If orders are met, the EU and US could jab their populations three times over, while Canada would have enough to do so nine times. It is obscene, Mr. Blinken.

At the same time, competition for diminishing vaccine supplies may lead to price spikes and further friction. Acrimony has erupted between the EU, UK and AstraZeneca over a shortfall in vaccine production. Meanwhile, in any situation where supplies are scarce and demand rises, it is poorer countries that will suffer most.

The Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was spot on when he said at the UNHRC meeting on Wednesday, “The pandemic has exacerbated old problems such as racism and xenophobia, as well as discrimination against national and religious minorities. Mass protests in the United States and Europe have exposed these countries’ continuing systemic inequalities, while highlighting the risks of condoning extremist ideologies.”

It is utter moral bankruptcy that the US and its rich allies in the Western world — the so-called “golden billion” on planet earth — walk into the UNHRC and start pontificating about human rights and pursue coercive approaches and unlawful methods of intimidation and pressure with narrow and self-serving geopolitical goals.

Again, aren’t the non-transparent policies of social networking platforms a matter of human rights, too? The US, in particular, undertook commitments to ensure freedom of access to information for all citizens but is now hiding behind corporate policies to avoid delivering on these commitments. As for the social networking platforms, they have begun to brazenly manipulate public opinion in the developing countries by banning or censoring user content at their own discretion. Now, they are, under US protection, trampling on the human rights of world citizens, aren’t they?

The human rights toolkit is universally applicable and there is not a single country on earth, including the US, which doesn’t have a problem with democracy and human rights. Isn’t it a crying shame that an average Black American lives six years less than his White fellow countrymen? Don’t the Black Americans get locked up in jails in much larger numbers than the Whites? But the US’ human rights standards are highly selective — it’s the “white man’s burden”.

Evidently, the toolkit becomes a potent weapon to stigmatise the US’ adversaries Russia and China; to pressure small countries that do not conform to US regional policies (such as Sri Lanka, Cuba or Venezuela); or to extract concessions from countries by blackmailing them (such as Saudi Arabia).

The toolkit has been used to bring about regime change too — that is, overthrow established governments and replace them with client regimes. The best known examples are Ukraine and Georgia. A recent attempt in Belarus flopped. A trial project in Russia in the recent weeks was simply squashed by the Kremlin. But it is a developing story. The countries in the periphery of Russia are being systematically destabilised and turned into theatres of geopolitical contestation so that the US’ great adversary will get entrapped in a quagmire.

The Biden administration is using this toolkit to try to re-establish the US’ trans-Atlantic leadership, which Europe is no longer comfortable with. Europe is experiencing the hidden charms of “strategic autonomy”. But the US cannot hope to exercise global hegemony without the western alliance system backing it, either. In this shadow play, Biden estimates that the human rights plank stands the best chance of bringing the US’ western allies on board under its leadership.

The US’ return to the UNHRC does not stem from noble intentions. It is primarily due to the worry over China’s increasing influence in the UN body during the US’ absence in the most recent years. Specifically, China stole a march over the US by bringing the pandemic under control and it has become an eyesore. Equally, China’s stance on human rights has growing resonance among the developing countries — that human rights should be relative to the situations of developing countries; that the concept of human rights should be diversified as there is no one-size-fits-all approach for human rights development; and that countries should not export their own model or use human rights issues to interfere in other countries’ domestic affairs.

Indeed, the western concept of human rights, narrowly focused on freedom of speech or religion and democratic elections tend to overlook that the basic right for the bulk of humanity is about living and development. The Western countries refuse to accept the fact that there are many roads to development and prosperity for the developing countries, and their path is only one of them and, perhaps, not even the best or the most suitable path.

Plainly put, human rights are being used as a tool to enforce and perpetuate the present global order in accordance with Western interests. However, it is a losing battle. A new world order is taking shape with a vastly different global humanitarian agenda, which will inevitably become the mainstream for human society.

According to a plan jointly issued this week by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council, China’s cabinet, on China’s comprehensive transportation network layout, the country aims to build all over the world 200,000 kilometres of railways, 460,000 kilometres of highways, and 25,000 kilometres of high-level sea lanes with 27 major coastal ports, 400 civil transportation airports and 80 express hubs by 2035, which will make the country not only a global production centre but “a logistics centre, trade centre, clearing centre and financial centre, laying a solid foundation for a path to be the world’s economic centre,” as an expert put it.

How could Biden Administration possibly counter this latest Chinese challenge? Unsurprisingly, the US is at its wit’s end in dealing with China’s surge. In 2020, China was over 70 percent the size of the US’ GDP. Current forecast is that it will surpass the US to be the world’s largest economy by 2028. T

he US realises that the economic race is pretty much lost already."

https://www.indianpunchline.com/us-e...n-will-it-fly/

Chinese Doctor, Silenced After Warning of Outbreak, Dies From Coronavirus


Dr. Li Wenliang issued a warning about a strange new virus.

Chinese Doctor, Silenced After Warning of Outbreak, Dies From Coronavirus - The New York Times


Evil fuckers

Originally Posted by OhOh

US exceptionalism surges again. Will it fly?

misskits opening post mentions Australia 13 times, and that ^ post of yours mentions it 0 times.

Originally Posted by OhOh

the Biden Administration is placing democracy and human rights at the centre of American foreign policy

Obviously the silly indian on the chinky payroll can't let that go, can he?

Democracy and Human Rights - things that strike terror into the heart of Mr. Shithole.

You'll probably like this too then- by an aussie abo (obviously on the chinese payroll).


Democracy is on the back foot. It has been declining globally for more than a decade. Democracies have been hijacked by demagogues and populists; the people have lost faith in the institutions of government. Growing inequality, corruption and the monopolisation of power by a "rich-get-richer" self-serving elite have revealed democracy to be a sham.

In a head-to-head match up with the United States — a country devastated by COVID-19, racially divided, opioid-addicted, ravaged by gun crime, with a seething, disenfranchised underclass, and reeling from the Trump years — Xi Jinping's China appears more stable and more secure.

The West's leadership failure on coronavirus is only helping China usurp it - ABC News


The more the transparency of the american glasshouse becomes apparent globally, the more they try to throw stones.

Originally Posted by sabang

In a head-to-head match up with the United States — a country devastated by COVID-19, racially divided, opioid-addicted, ravaged by gun crime, with a seething, disenfranchised underclass, and reeling from the Trump years — Xi Jinping's China appears more stable and more secure.

You can be stable and secure when you can jail/"reeducate"/disappear anyone who disagrees with you.

Yes, poor Julian Assange.

Originally Posted by lom

misskits opening post mentions Australia 13 times, and that ^ post of yours mentions it 0 times.

You are correct. I did consider starting another thread but decided otherwise.

The OP also states various countries upholding and applauding its stance. To enhance the OZ standing, but also "internationalising" the thread.

One may deduce that from the OP a certain group's "human rights" are being allegedly abused.

My recent post was regarding "human rights" generally, as opposed to one particular countries standing, on one particular human rights question.

I tend to see if a thread has become established on a subject. If so I will post there rather than starting another similar thread as I feel, possibly wrongly to some, that one loses focus on a topic if spread over many threads.

But yes OZ is not the focus of the post but the "human rights" of all countries citizens aspects. Which you and others may feel require another thread. Which may reduce the discussions somewhat. Maybe a poll is required or a Mods statement to inform us all, of the preferred method of interaction.

Double post.

Why to singled the ban only on one area? Isn’t the state policy same in the whole country?

Originally Posted by sabang

Yes, poor Julian Assange.

A genuine criminal and Putin lackey who deserves locking up.

Originally Posted by OhOh

Maybe a poll is required or a Mods statement to inform us all, of the preferred method of interaction.

Maybe you should just stop fucking waffling.