The US has banned imports of products made with Xinjiang cotton.

The justification is that China oppresses minorities in this province and imposes forced labor and other forms of torture. Products made with Xinjiang cotton have been illegal in the US since January 2021. But nearly a year on, goods with tainted cotton are still reaching American consumers.

Dozens of intermediary manufacturers from Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Vietnam, India, Pakistan, Kenya, Ethiopia, China and Mexico purchase unfinished cotton goods from Chinese manufacturers who source Xinjiang cotton. Well-known international brands are supplied by those intermediaries and are thus at high risk of being seen as having Xinjiang cotton in their supply chains. But despite the US ban, exports of textiles and garments from Xinjiang increased by 53 per cent in the first nine months of the year 2021.

More than half of China’s exports of cotton semi-finished products are destined for countries within Asia such as Bangladesh, Vietnam, Indonesia and Cambodia. About 85 percent of cotton grown in China is produced in Xinjiang, which amounts to 22 percent of global cotton production.

China has denied the existence of Xinjiang detainment camps or forced labor transfers, describing them instead as vocational centers and poverty alleviation programs.