The Lesson in China’s Cotton Slave Trade

'(M)oney talks and slavery walks.' And Western corporations profit. The CCP must be destroyed! #SmashTheCCP #BoycottChineseGoods

From the Washington Examiner

By The Editors

Even for the Chinese Communist Party, its Uighur cotton slave trade is truly shocking. We’ve learned that "upwards of half a million" Uighur Muslims are forced into annual low-wage servitude as cotton pickers in Xinjiang province. Sometimes relocated hundreds of kilometers away from their families, these peoples and their rich culture have been subjugated. These innocents now exist only as drones for the Chinese economy.

It's just the latest discovery from the world in which China's Uighur population lives. Beijing has created this world to ensure the Communist Party's dominion over Uighur lives and Uighur minds. Establishing a vast network of concentration camps that have imprisoned approximately 2 million people, China has enforced relentless reeducation programs and even sterilization against the Uighur people. These innocents are witnesses to the dystopian reality of what Xi Jinping calls his "Chinese dream." As it was for those cotton-picking slaves of early America, this life is now a nightmare.

All Americans and free peoples should take note of this truth. The fact that, in the 21st century, a great power is using its own people as effective slave labor demands urgent attention. This is especially true in relation to China, seeing as Xi's dream is to impose his dark vision on the rest of the world. As proved by the Chinese Communist Party's conduct in Xinjiang, Hong Kong, and its aggression against even the mildest of Xi's critics, this is not a regime that has any respect for others. Indeed, it admits as much. In a regime propaganda report discovered by Adrian Zenz, a researcher who assisted the BBC’s investigation into the matter, Uighurs are lamented for “deep-rooted, lazy thinking,” and their excessive desire to “bring up children.”

Confronted with the evidence of its evil, Beijing simply does what it does best.

Double down on deception. In an absurd response to a journalist's inquiry on the BBC story this week, a foreign ministry spokesman insisted that the vast physical apparatus of Uighur repression is, in fact, just a collection of standard-fare buildings. All these facilities, the spokesperson said, are "all civil institutions. For instance, the so-called 'detention centers' in Tulufan are actually the buildings of the local administrative offices, and the 'detention centers' in Kashi are actually local high school campuses."

The world cannot ignore this reality. Out of the 30 multinational companies that do business with Chinese firms that might benefit from the Uighur oppression, only three offered a commitment to verifying their processes. Nine such companies had no response. We note that many Western companies and interests such as those of the film industry and the NBA are quick to apologize effusively for offending the Chinese Communist Party. Not so much when it comes to protecting their supply chains from oppression in Xinjiang and Hong Kong. Apparently, Politicians should also pay close heed to this tragedy.

If China is willing to treat its own citizens so terribly, what might it do to the rest of us? If China is willing to lie blatantly and unapologetically about its vast network of servitude, what other lies might it tell? As President-elect Joe Biden takes office, he must bear keen attention to these concerns. They must inform the Biden administration’s assessment of China’s pledges on the origins of the coronavirus, climate change, intellectual property, and security issues in the South China Sea. A new mantra should be born in relation to all U.S. government and commercial dealings with Beijing: Don’t trust until you can verify, verify, verify.

Yet, the moral point cannot be lost on us. As you read this, hundreds of thousands of innocent people have been forcibly relocated from their homes. Their sacred values are being shredded and their identities, Beijing hopes, crushed. Their aspirations for family, faith, and future subordinated to slavery in service of a communist regime that proclaims its commitment to the people.

This is a disgrace that should forever stain Xi and his regime.