Osaka [Japan]May 21 (ANI): The Japanese sportswear company Mizuno Corporation announced on Friday its decision to stop using cotton coming from China’s Xinjiang region, believed to reflect concerns over Beijing’s human rights allegations against Uighur Muslims.
Mizuno did not officially reveal the reason for its decision, saying it would have a minimal impact because Xinjiang cotton is only a small amount of the material used in its sportswear, reports Kyodo News.
The company said that the production of products containing Xinjiang cotton will be discontinued and will not be refilled when it is sold out.
Earlier this week, U.S. Customs and Border Protection blocked a shipment of men’s shirts for the Uniqlo clothing chain in January for allegedly violating a import ban on cotton goods from Xinjiang, Kyodo News reported.
Tadashi Yanai, chairman and CEO of the chain’s operator Fast Retailing Co., said last month that the Japanese company would immediately stop trading with suppliers if it was found that products were made by forced labor.
China has been reprimanded globally for cracking down on Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang by sending them to mass concentration camps, interfering in their religious activities and subjecting them to abuse, including forced labor.
Beijing, on the other hand, has vehemently denied involvement in human rights abuses against the Uighurs in Xinjiang, while reports from journalists, NGOs and former prisoners have surfaced highlighting the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) brutal violence against ethnic society. .
The United States banned imports of cotton and tomato products from Xinjiang in January, followed by Canada and the United Kingdom. Many international brands, including HM, Nike and Ralph Lauren, have also signed up to declare that their products are not made of Xinjiang cotton, the South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported. HM was forced to close 20 stores in China after its statement on forced labor in Xinjiang leading to uproar among Chinese citizens and authorities. At the same time, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway and Sweden have issued a joint statement expressing serious concern about the human rights of Uighurs and other Turkish Muslims. minorities in China’s Xinjiang Province. (ANI)
Source: sn.dk
