Xinjiang: Uyghurs

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Monday 29th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Nigel Adams]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for putting so concisely his concern on this matter. I can tell him that we have been very active on this issue. We have played a leading role in raising these concerns bilaterally and at the United Nations.

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. We have concerns about the detention and human rights abuses, with more than a million Uyghur Muslims and other minorities detained in political re-education camps—some people may refer to them as other things—and we deplore the systematic restrictions on their culture and practice of Islam, alongside the targeted surveillance of minorities.

On 10 March, at the 43rd session of the United Nations Human Rights Council, we raised our concerns specifically about the violations and with regard to forced labour in Xinjiang, under our item 4 statement. On 9 March, the Foreign Secretary raised the same concerns about Xinjiang with his Chinese counterpart. As I said in my statement, I have spoken directly to the Chinese ambassador to raise our concerns about human rights in Xinjiang. On 25 February, at the 43rd session of the UN Human Rights Council, the Minister responsible for human rights, Lord Ahmad, directly raised his concerns about Xinjiang during his opening address at the conference. We call on China to allow the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights unfettered access to the region.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith) and associate myself, somewhat surprisingly, with the words of the Labour Front-Bench spokesman, the hon. Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock)—that is a welcome change.

I have heard the various comments made by my right hon. Friend and the hon. Gentleman, and I have heard the Minister’s answers, which I support. Will the Minister perhaps look at the companies operating here in the United Kingdom that may have benefited from some of the labour in Xinjiang that he described and explain why they are able to operate here in the UK? Why are they able to use labour from these camps for re-education, at best, and very often for worse? Why are these companies seemingly able to operate around the world as though they were ordinary companies?

[Nigel Adams]

The Chairman of the Select Committee is right to raise that point. He will be aware that bidders for any central Government contracts above certain thresholds are required to confirm that they are compliant with the transparency requirements in the Modern Slavery Act 2015. However, the decision on high-risk vendors did not involve the award of a contract to the telecommunications firm to which I assume the Chairmen of Select Committee may have been referring. We take this issue very seriously, and, as I said in my statement, all British companies involved in the region must consider carrying out proper due diligence to ensure that human rights violations have not been taking place in their supply chains.