Ed Miliband faces renewed call to ban Uighur forced labour-linked imports

Will Meakin-Durrant, Press Association Political Staff

Ed Miliband is facing a renewed call to ban imports linked to Uighur forced labour.

The new Foreign Secretary has also been urged to work internationally on “coordinated sanctions against those responsible for atrocities” and to declare China’s treatment of Uighur people a genocide.

The pleas have come from Rahima Mahmut, executive director at the charity Stop Uighur Genocide, who wrote in a letter that the Labour Government has so far failed to produce a “decisive strategy to confront” Beijing’s treatment of minority groups.

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has previously warned China might be violating the “fundamental freedoms” of Uighur peoples, and work schemes in the country “may involve elements of coercion and discrimination on religious and ethnic grounds”.

In her letter, seen by the Press Association, Ms Mahmut wrote: “For Uighurs inside our homeland, ordinary acts – praying, teaching children about their heritage or communicating with relatives abroad – may lead to interrogation, imprisonment or disappearance.

“For Uighurs overseas, the repression crosses borders – families are threatened because of words spoken in London, while members of the diaspora are watched, intimidated and pressured into silence.

“I know this pain personally.

“I left my homeland over two decades ago. Since 2017, I have lost contact with almost my entire family.

“Years later, I learned that my eldest sister had died. My brother spent years in detention.

“My cousin, a high school teacher, endured five years across camps and prisons. When she was released, she was physically and psychologically broken.”

Ms Mahmut added Uighurs in the UK “placed considerable hope in the Labour Government elected two years ago” but warned last year’s China Audit “produced no decisive strategy to confront Uighur forced labour or prevent tainted goods from entering British markets”.

She told Mr Miliband: “The twentieth century taught us, at an unbearable human cost, that economic power must never be allowed to purchase silence over persecution.”

Ms Mahmut wrote: “Foreign Secretary, history will not judge Britain by how many times ministers said they raised human rights concerns behind closed doors.

“It will judge whether those concerns changed policy and behaviour.”

In addition to a ban on “goods linked to state-imposed Uighur forced labour” and a declaration of genocide, Ms Mahmut urged Mr Miliband to “require companies to map and disclose their supply chains”.

Her letter is not the first plea Mr Miliband has faced to block imports linked to forced labour.

When he was setting up Great British Energy, the Lords piled pressure on Mr Miliband to stop taxpayer money being used to buy renewable products with “credible evidence” of modern slavery in the supply chain.

As a concession, ministers accepted that “measures for ensuring that slavery and human trafficking is not taking place in its business or supply chains” should be among Great British Energy’s objectives, as part of the Great British Energy Act 2025.

The Sheffield-based Helena Kennedy Centre for International Justice published a report on Uighur forced labour and global solar supply chains five years ago.

It found 90 Chinese and international companies whose supply chains were linked to forced labour, and 11 companies engaged in forced labour transfers.

A Foreign Office spokesperson said: “We stand firm on human rights, including China’s repression of the peoples of Xinjiang.

“The UK Government frequently raises concerns with the Chinese government and we continue to coordinate efforts internationally to hold China to account for any human rights violations.

“Our approach to China is consistent – we will co-operate where we can and challenge where we must.”

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