(Bloomberg) — The European Union wants to ban products made with forced labor in a broad proposal meant to address China’s alleged abuse of Uyghur labor, although the bloc would stop short of singling out goods from the region of Xinjiang.
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The proposed Forced Labor Products Ban, from the European Commission, covers goods imported from third countries as well as those made within the EU. The bloc’s executive cited statistics from the United Nations’ International Labor Organization that an estimated 27.6 million people work in forced labor.
“Our aim is to eliminate all products made with forced labor from the EU market, irrespective of where they have been made,” Executive Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis said in a statement.
The EU’s proposal stands in stark contrast to a US law passed last year that targets the practice of forced labor in China. The US’s Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act bans any item even partially produced in the region of Xinjiang from entering the US unless a company can prove it was not made with forced labor.
The EU’s proposed ban however does not specifically target China or its alleged use of Uyghur labor to make everything from cotton to tomato products. Members of the European Parliament have called for a similar US-style ban, but EU officials said its proposal must comply with both World Trade Organization rules and international law.
Beijing has dismissed allegations of rights abuses in Xinjiang as the “lie of the century,” and conducted tours for international diplomats that emphasized the Alaska-sized region’s political stability and economic transformation.
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EU officials emphasized that forced labor is happening everywhere in every continent, thus the EU’s proposal will be more effective by covering all products regardless of where they’ve been made.
Still, under the commission’s proposal, which requires the approval of the EU’s 27 countries and the European Parliament, the bloc would be able to withdraw or ban any product that was found to use forced labor at any stage of production — a move that could increase tensions with China in the future.
National authorities would first conduct investigations, gathering information from companies and conducting inspections, on any goods that could have been produced with forced labor. Customs authorities would also be able to stop any goods at the borders. The act would also create a database to coordinate risks across the union.
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