Tag: abuses

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Politics

U.S. blacklists 34 Chinese language entities over human rights abuses, brain-control weapons

U.S. blacklists 34 Chinese entities over human rights abuses, brain-control weapons

Chinese and US flags fly in front of a company building in Shanghai, China, 16 November 2021.

Aly song | Reuters

WASHINGTON – The Biden government said Thursday it has imposed trade restrictions on more than 30 Chinese research institutes and facilities for human rights abuses and the alleged development of technologies, such as brain control weapons, that undermine US national security.

The Ministry of Commerce accused the Chinese Academy of Military Medical Sciences and eleven of its research institutes of using biotechnology “to support the end uses and end users of the Chinese military and to pick up alleged brain control weapons,” a statement in the federal register said.

The communication does not go into any further details of the alleged brain control weapons.

“The scientific pursuit of biotechnology and medical innovation can save lives. Unfortunately, the PRC is choosing to use these technologies to take control of its population and its repression from members of ethnic and religious minorities, “wrote US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo in a statement referring to the People’s Republic of China and human rights abuses in China’s extreme western region of Xinjiang.

The Foreign Ministry had previously described the abuse of Uyghurs and members of other Muslim minorities, such as in the Xinjiang region, as “widespread, state-sponsored forced labor” and “mass detention.”

Earlier this month, the White House announced a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, citing “ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang and other human rights abuses.”

Beijing denies abusing religious and ethnic minorities in Xinjiang.

The Commerce Department has added four other Chinese companies to its entity list because of their role in modernizing the Chinese military, which runs counter to US national security and foreign policy interests.

The department also added five other Chinese companies that reportedly “acquired or attempted to acquire technology from the United States to help modernize the People’s Liberation Army.”

US officials have long complained that intellectual property theft by China has cost the economy billions of dollars in revenue and thousands of jobs. You also said that it threatens national security. Meanwhile, Beijing claims it is not involved in intellectual property theft.

The Chinese Embassy in Washington, DC, did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.

The Department of Commerce also took action against companies in Georgia, Malaysia and Turkey for allegedly “diverting or attempting to divert US items for Iranian military programs.”

“In particular, these units are part of a network that is used to supply or attempt to supply Iran with items of US origin that would ultimately provide material support to the Iranian defense industry in violation of US export controls,” it says in the message.

In total, the Ministry of Commerce took action against 34 companies in China, three in Georgia, one in Malaysia and two in Turkey.

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Business

Mexican Factories Accused of Labor Abuses, Testing U.S.M.C.A.

Mexican Factories Accused of Labor Abuses, Testing U.S.M.C.A.

WASHINGTON – The AFL-CIO and other groups on Monday filed a complaint with the Biden government over alleged labor law violations at a group of auto parts factories in Mexico. This will be an early test of the new North American trade agreement and its deals with OSH.

The complaint is focused on the Tridonex auto parts factories in the town of Matamoros, just across the border with Brownsville, Texas. The AFL-CIO said workers there had been harassed and fired for their efforts to organize with an independent union, SNITIS, instead of a company-controlled union. Susana Prieto Terrazas, a Mexican labor lawyer and SNITIS leader, was arrested and jailed last year in an episode that received a lot of attention.

The trade deal, the deal between the United States, Mexico and Canada, was negotiated by the Trump administration to replace the North American free trade agreement and went into effect last summer. While negotiated by a Republican government, the deal had significant input from Congressional Democrats, who controlled the House and insisted on stricter labor and environmental standards to vote for the pact, which required Congressional approval.

The trade pact called on Mexico to make profound changes to its work system, where bogus collective bargaining agreements, so-called protection agreements, concluded with no worker involvement and with low wages, were prevalent.

The complaint is placed under the trade agreement under a novel “rapid response” mechanism that enables complaints of labor violations to be filed against an individual factory and penalties to be imposed on that factory. The complaint was made by the AFL-CIO, Service Employees International Union, SNITIS, and Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch.

“USMCA is asking Mexico to end the protection union government and its corrupt dealings with employers,” said Richard L. Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, in a statement using the acronym for the trade deal. “The ongoing harassment of Susana Prieto and SNITIS members is a textbook violation of the labor laws that Mexico is committed to complying with.”

The trade deal aims to improve working conditions and pay workers in Mexico, which proponents say would benefit American workers by discouraging factory owners from moving operations from the US to Mexico in search of cheaper labor. Enforcing the pact is one of the greatest trade challenges facing the Biden government.

Tridonex is a Philadelphia-based subsidiary of Cardone Industries and controlled by Toronto-based Brookfield Asset Management, the AFL-CIO said. In 2016, Cardone announced plans to move its brakes division to Mexico and lay off more than 1,300 workers in Philadelphia. This is evident from news and public records.

The complaint contains several allegations of labor violations, including that workers were unable to elect their union leaders or ratify their collective agreement, and that more than 600 workers were dismissed by their employer for retaliation. She also accuses Tamaulipas State of denying workers the right to vote for the union they represent.

“There couldn’t be a clearer case,” said Mary Kay Henry, international president of the Service Employees International Union, which represents Cardone employees in Philadelphia.

In a statement, Cardone said it was “obliged to conduct labor practices, cultivate constructive relationships with workers and fully respect the universal principle of freedom of association and the right to collective bargaining”.

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May 10, 2021, 1:30 p.m. ET

“We are committed to fully complying with all applicable labor laws and regulations regarding our Tridonex facilities in Matamoros, Mexico,” the statement said. “Should an investigation be initiated to discuss this further, we would appreciate it and be fully transparent and responsive in handling all government information requests.”

The quick response mechanism in the trade agreement enables the United States to take action against a single factory in Mexico if workers there are denied the right to freedom of association and collective bargaining. It was one of the provisions that the Democrats highlighted as an improvement on the final deal over the original version of the Trump administration’s trade deal.

If the United States decides there is enough evidence that workers’ rights are being denied, it would urge Mexico to conduct a review of the allegations. After this step, a panel could be set up to investigate the matter. As part of the quick response process, the factory could face fines and repeat offenders could even prevent their goods from entering the US.

Mexico approved a revision of its labor laws in 2019, but it will be rolled out gradually over several years, and implementation of the changes remains a major question mark.

A report released in December by an independent committee set up by the United States to monitor job changes said Mexico has made progress but significant obstacles remain. The report found that the protection contract system was still in place and that most unionized workers were still unable to democratically elect their leaders.

United Steelworkers’ director of international affairs and chairman of the board, Ben Davis, said the complaint filed Monday had “all elements of the structural problem we are facing over labor rights in Mexico.” The quick response mechanism is a way to hold companies accountable.

‘This is the first time we have had something like this in a trade agreement,’ he said, ‘and so we think it’s pretty important that it’s used, used effectively and hopefully something that we can apply. ” in other places. “

Democrats in Congress welcomed the complaint. “We expect and urge the Biden administration to use all available resources to take aggressive enforcement action in this case,” said Richard E. Neal from Massachusetts, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, and Earl Blumenauer from Oregon , Chairman of the panel’s trade subcommittee, said in a statement.

It remains to be seen how the Biden administration will react to the complaint. One administration official said the administration would “carefully examine” complaints about quick response mechanisms.

United States Trade Representative Katherine Tai was previously the chief trade adviser to the powerful Ways and Means Committee. In this post, she played a key role in the negotiations between the House Democrats and the Trump administration over the revision of the trade deal.

Ms. Tai has said enforcement of the agreement is a priority and the first meeting of the commission overseeing the pact – made up of Ms. Tai and her colleagues from Canada and Mexico – is due to take place next week for the Mexican embassy in Washington, according to a spokeswoman .

At a Senate hearing last month, Ms. Tai said there were “a number of concerns about Mexico’s compliance with USMCA commitments,” without giving details.

“We have done our best to use the most effective enforcement tools we know,” she said at another point in the hearing. “And they might not be perfect, but we won’t know how effective they’ll be if we don’t use them.”

Categories
Politics

U.S. Joins Allies to Punish Chinese language Officers for Human Rights Abuses

U.S. Joins Allies to Punish Chinese Officials for Human Rights Abuses

WASHINGTON – The United States on Monday imposed sanctions on top Chinese officials as part of a multinational effort to punish Beijing for human rights abuses against the largely Muslim Uighur minority that American officials have labeled genocide.

The penalties – in coordination with the European Union, the UK and Canada – come days after the Biden government’s heated encounter with Chinese officials in Alaska and will most likely heighten tensions between Washington and Beijing.

“Amid increasing international condemnation, the PRC continues to commit genocide and crimes against humanity,” Foreign Minister Antony J. Blinken said Monday in a statement referring to the People’s Republic of China.

“The United States reiterates its call on the PRC to end the suppression of predominantly Muslim Uyghurs and other ethnic and religious minorities in Xinjiang, including by releasing all those arbitrarily detained in detention centers and detention centers,” he added.

The United States sentenced Wang Junzheng, secretary of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps Party Committee, and Chen Mingguo, director of the Xinjiang Public Security Bureau, for their roles in the detention and serious abuse of Uighur Muslims and other ethnic minorities in Xinjiang said the finance department.

The sanctions were imposed under the Global Magnitsky Act, which allows the executive branch to use economic penalties to punish officials from other nations for human rights violations. The action will freeze any assets these officials hold in the United States.

The US move came hours after the European Union, the United Kingdom and Canada imposed their own sanctions on Chinese officials and organizations for human rights abuses in Xinjiang. The European Union, along with the Xinjiang Public Security Bureau, reached out to four Chinese officials. The UK has done the same. Canada has not published the names of its destinations.

In response to the European Union’s action on Monday, Chinese officials imposed sanctions on 10 Europeans, including members of the European Parliament.

“This move, based on nothing but lies and disinformation, ignores and distorts facts,” said Zhao Lijian, a spokesman for China’s Foreign Ministry, in a statement condemning the European Union’s actions, adding that the efforts made “which severely affects China’s internal affairs” and “seriously undermines China-EU relations. “

Mr Blinken said the joint action was an effort by the United States to “work multilaterally to advance respect for human rights.” A joint statement by top diplomats representing the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, among others, called for Beijing to “end and arbitrarily release its repressive practices against Uighur Muslims and members of other ethnic and religious minorities in Xinjiang and arrested . “

China’s crackdown on Uyghurs has included forced sterilization and the sending of hundreds of thousands – if not a million or more – to indoctrination camps to promote loyalty to the Chinese Communist Party and break adherence to Islam.

In a separate action on Monday, the United States, in coordination with the European Union, announced sanctions naming military officials and other units in Myanmar for their violent suppression of democratic protests.

US action against Beijing appears to be in line with the diplomatic vision of Mr Blinken and Jake Sullivan, National Security Advisor to President Biden, at their first face-to-face meeting with Chinese officials in Alaska last week. Mr Sullivan said the United States remained “divided” over the challenges facing the world’s two largest economic and technology powers.

The penalties also follow the Biden administration’s decision to impose sanctions on 24 Chinese officials for undermining democratic freedoms in Hong Kong, and are similar to the Trump administration’s strategy of using sanctions as a means to punish Chinese officials for violating human rights.

Omer Kanat, the executive director of the Uighur Human Rights Project, praised the coordinated efforts of many nations to punish Chinese officials.

“Unprecedented cooperation between governments like this will end the genocide,” Kanat said in a statement on Monday. “This is what Uyghurs have asked – the dam has broken and the reaction has finally begun.”

Ana Swanson contributed to the coverage.

Categories
Politics

US sanctions two Chinese language officers for human rights abuses towards Uyghurs

US sanctions two Chinese officials for human rights abuses against Uyghurs

Chinese and American flags outside the building of an American company in Beijing, China January 21, 2021.

Tingshu Wang | Reuterss

WASHINGTON – The Biden government on Monday sanctioned two Chinese officials for their role in serious human rights violations against ethnic minorities in Xinjiang.

China’s Wang Junzheng, secretary of the Xinjiang Manufacturing and Construction Corps Party Committee, and Chen Mingguo, director of the Xinjiang Public Security Bureau, have been punished against Uyghurs for their links to “arbitrary detention and aggravated physical abuse, including serious human rights violations,” said the Treasury Department in a statement on Monday.

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Beijing previously denied US allegations that it committed genocide against the Uyghurs, a Muslim population native to the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in northwest China.

China has also said the allegations of the use of detention centers are unfounded and that it is instead using vocational training facilities to stamp out Islamist extremism and separatism.

The sanctions imposed by the Biden government complement measures taken today by the European Union, the United Kingdom and Canada.

The sanctions follow a dispute between Foreign Minister Antony Blinken and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan as well as top Chinese diplomat Yang Jiechi and State Councilor Wang Yi in Alaska.

Blinken has already accused China of coercion and aggression at home and in the region.

This story evolves. Please try again.

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World News

Biden says U.S. and Europe should push again in opposition to China’s financial abuses

Biden says U.S. and Europe must push back against China's economic abuses

President Joe Biden said Friday that the US and its international partners must hold China accountable for explaining its economic practices.

“We must defend ourselves against the abuses and coercions of the Chinese government, which undermine the foundations of the international economic system,” said Biden in a speech at the Munich Security Conference, which was practically delivered by the White House.

“Everyone has to play by the same rules,” he said at the annual international policy meeting.

Biden’s appearance, his debut to an international audience since taking office as president, came as his administration tried to maintain a tough stance on China as it moved away from former President Donald Trump’s militant relationship with Beijing.

The Trump administration sought to reshape trade relations between the US and China, with an emphasis on encouraging Beijing to buy US goods while addressing issues such as intellectual property protection and forced technology transfers.

After reaching the first “phase” of a deal, Trump canceled an additional round of trade talks with China in 2020, to which he attributed the full spread of the coronavirus pandemic.

Trump’s “America First” policies also alienated some European leaders long allied with the United States. Biden has made it clear that he intends to improve relations with America’s international partners.

“I know that the last few years have strained and tested our transatlantic relationship. But the United States is determined to reconnect with Europe,” said Biden at the beginning of his speech on Friday.

Before making his presentation, Biden met with leaders of the G7, the group of nations that includes Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the US, to develop a global response to the Covid pandemic discuss.

In a joint statement following that meeting, the G7 vowed to “work together and work with others to make 2021 a turning point for multilateralism”.

The G7 statement also announced that member states would allocate US $ 7.5 billion to COVAX, an international initiative aimed at improving access to Covid vaccines. The White House said Thursday that the US would pledge $ 4 billion to global vaccination efforts through 2022.

According to the statement, the G7 meeting also touched China. “With the aim of promoting a fair and mutually beneficial global economic system for all people, we will work with others, especially with G20 countries, including large economies like China,” it said.

Biden went on in his speech.

“US and European companies are required to publicly announce corporate governance structures … and to adhere to rules to prevent corruption and monopoly practices. Chinese companies should adhere to the same standard,” said the president.

“We have to stand up for the democratic values ​​that make it possible to achieve all of this and defend ourselves against those who would monopolize and normalize oppression,” said Biden.

The Chinese embassy in the United States did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request to comment on Biden’s speech.

The President noted that “in this way we too can counter the threat from Russia”, which seeks to “weaken the European project and our NATO alliance”.

“The challenges with Russia may be different from those with China, but they are just as real,” said Biden.

“It’s not about playing East against West. It’s not about we want a conflict. We want a future in which all nations can freely determine their own path without the threat of violence or coercion,” said Biden. “We cannot and must not return to the reflexive opposition and rigid blocks of the Cold War.”

Read the full G7 joint statement:

“We, the leaders of the Group of Seven, met today and decided to work together to beat and rebuild COVID-19 better. Because of our strengths and values ​​as democratic, open economies and societies, we will work together and work with others. ” Make 2021 a turning point for multilateralism and create a recovery that promotes the health and prosperity of our people and our planet.

“We will step up collaboration on the health response to COVID-19. The dedication of key workers everywhere represents the best of humankind, while the rapid discovery of vaccines shows the power of human ingenuity. Working with and collaboratively strengthening the World Health Organization (WHO ) and support their leading and coordinating role, we will: Accelerate the global development and use of vaccines, work with industry to increase production capacity, including through voluntary licensing, improve the exchange of information, for example in the sequencing of new variants, and promote transparent and responsible practices and trust in vaccines. We reaffirm our support for all pillars of access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator (ACT-A), its COVAX facility and affordable and equitable access to vaccines, therapeutics a and diagnostics, reflecting the role of comprehensive vaccination as a global public good. Today, with increased financial commitments of over $ 4 billion for ACT-A and COVAX, co. G7 support comes to $ 7.5 billion. We invite all partners, including the G20 and international financial institutions, to join us in increasing support for ACT-A, including providing developing countries with access to WHO-approved vaccines through the COVAX facility.

“COVID-19 shows that the world needs stronger defense against future risks to global health security. We will work with the WHO, the G20 and others, particularly at the Global Health Summit in Rome, on the global health and health security architecture pandemic preparedness, including through health funding and rapid response mechanisms, strengthening the One Health approach and universal health coverage, and exploring the potential value of a global health contract.

“We have provided more than $ 6 trillion in unprecedented support to our economies in the G7 over the past year. We will continue to support our economies in protecting jobs and supporting a strong, sustainable, balanced and inclusive recovery. We reaffirm our support for high-risk countries, our commitment to the Sustainable Development Goals and our partnership with Africa, including support for a stable recovery, and we will work together through the G20 and the international financial institutions to increase support for countries’ responses by examining all available tools, including through full and transparent implementation of the Debt Service Suspension Initiative and Common Framework.

“The recovery from COVID-19 needs to get better for everyone. With UNFCCC COP26 and CBD COP15 in mind, we will focus our plans on our global ambitions for climate change and reversing biodiversity loss. We will make progress in containment, adaptation and funding in line with the Paris Agreement and providing a green transformation and clean energy transition that will reduce emissions and create good jobs on the way to net zero by no later than 2050. We strive to align our economies in this way that no geographic region or person, regardless of gender or ethnicity, will be left behind. We will: Promote open economies and societies that promote global economic resilience, Use the free flow digital economy with confidence, participate in a modernized, freer and g More honest rules-based multilateral trade system that reflects our values ​​and delivers balanced growth with a reformed World Trade Organization at its center and a consensus-based international solution that seeks taxation by mid-2021 under the OECD. With the aim of supporting a fair and mutually beneficial global economic system for all people, we will work with others, especially G20 countries, including large economies like China. As leaders, we will deliberate on collective approaches to address non-market strategies and practices, and we will work with others to address important global issues that affect all countries.

“We resolve to agree concrete actions on these priorities at the G7 UK summit in June, and we support Japan’s commitment to safely host the Tokyo 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games this summer as a symbol of world unity Overcoming COVID-19. “