Xinjiang: will the West’s sanctions on China force the issue or unravel?

US, EU, Britain and Canada sanctioned officials for alleged human rights abuses in the region, after previous bans targeting its cotton and tomato products

As brands and governments argue over claims of forced labour in Xinjiang, producer of a fifth of the world’s cotton, observers debate sanctions’ possible impact

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Published: 7:00am, 16 Apr 2021Updated: 11:54pm, 4 Jun 2021

Since 2019, dozens of Chinese officials and companies have been sanctioned or blacklisted by the West over alleged human rights abuses against Uygurs and members of other minorities in China’s western Xinjiang region.

In January, alleged widespread use of forced labour in Xinjiang prompted the United States to ban imports of cotton and tomato products from the region, and Canada and Britain to announce similar bans.

The latest sanctions in March from the European Union, the US, Britain and Canada mean that specified Chinese officials will be unable to travel to the sanctioning countries, and their assets there will be seized. They will probably have difficulty maintaining bank accounts, even Chinese ones.

As international pressure on Beijing increases, it remains to be seen whether blacklisting firms and banning imports of Chinese products connected to Xinjiang will have a substantial economic impact. Some observers see the sanctions as merely symbolic objections to growing claims of repression in the region, which are unlikely to be heeded by Beijing.

According to Nick Marro, global trade lead at the Economist Intelligence Unit in Hong Kong, the sanctions would probably not have a discernible macroeconomic impact on China because they were “quite targeted” and carried “more symbolic than economic weight”. The real economic impact also depended on how stringently they would be enforced, he said.

“The cotton industry is notoriously complex, and it could be difficult to clearly trace cotton items back to production in Xinjiang – a lot of this could ultimately come down to regulatory discretion by US authorities,” Marro said. Even if broad bans risked more consequences for US consumers rather than the Chinese economy, it would force compliance from companies looking to sell in the US market, he said.

“In effect, these companies had little choice but to disavow the use of Xinjiang cotton in their supply chains,” Marro said. “And that doesn’t even touch on the potential ethical and reputational risks that Western firms might face among their home market consumers.”