The International Finance Corporation (IFC), a World Bank unit that receives funding from governments worldwide and lends to the private sector in developing countries, proed $486 million in financing to the companies in recent years, despite its public pledge to uphold human and labor rights, the researchers said.
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“Significant eence suggests that several of IFC’s clients are active participants in the implementation of [China’s] campaign of repression against the Uyghurs, including through forced labor,” concluded the report, which was published in conjunction with the Atlantic Council.
At least two of the companies mentioned in the report apparently export to the United States and Europe.
Western governments and human rights groups have long accused Chinese authorities of waging a campaign of repression in Xinjiang against Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities through extrajudicial detention, land confiscation and other means. Beijing has denied the accusations.
“Even as governments worldwide condemn what is going on in Xinjiang … our taxpayer dollars are actively underwriting the companies contributing to these atrocities,” Laura T. Murphy, professor of human rights and contemporary slavery at Britain’s Sheffield Hallam University and one of the report’s authors, said during a presentation Thursday.
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The IFC declined to address the researchers’ specific findings, which were first reported by CNN. In an emailed statement, the lending body said it “takes allegations of forced labor and poor treatment of vulnerable groups very seriously.”
“We do not tolerate discrimination or forced labor under any circumstances. Whenever such serious allegations are brought to our attention, we work to verify and address them with our clients with urgency,” the statement said.
The report focuses on four companies with extensive operations in Xinjiang, a large, arid region in northwestern China. The companies accepted workers through state-run “labor transfer” and “poverty alleviation” programs that coerce Xinjiang residents, often from poor, rural regions, to accept jobs that are sometimes hours from their homes, the researchers said.
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The Chinese companies couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.
Camel Group, a manufacturer of batteries for automobiles, received a $36 million loan from the IFC in 2019 for a battery-recycling facility, according to the report and IFC disclosures.
Two years earlier, the company accepted workers from a state-sponsored program that transferred laborers from southern Xinjiang to workplaces more than 620 miles away, in the northern part of Xinjiang, the report said.
The workers were submitted to a 10-day, state-run training session that they were not allowed to leave, where they received ideological training and were required to sing patriotic songs, according to the report, which cites a local government post on social media.
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Then there was a “handover ceremony” through which the workers were dispatched to companies, including Camel Group, according to the report.
The researchers also focused on Century Sunshine Group Holdings, a fertilizer manufacturer that has received a number of IFC loans over the years, including a $125 million loan approved in 2015. The company exports some of its products to Europe and the United States, according to the report.
In 2017, a subsidiary of the company accepted 10 laborers who had been transferred from rural areas through a state-sponsored “poverty alleviation” program, according to the researchers, who cite an article published by the local city government.
Jointown Pharmaceutical Group, a manufacturer and distributor, is described in the report as having received more than 200 workers from southern Xinjiang through a state-sponsored labor-transfer program. Company representatives gave Chinese media this information at an event in December 2020, according to the report, which cites an article published by a Xinjiang government agency.
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Chenguang Biotech Group, which produces plant-based extracts and food additives, received a $40 million loan from the IFC in 2019. According to Chinese state media cited by the researchers, the company’s facilities in Xinjiang recruited workers through state-run poverty-alleviation and labor-transfer schemes.
“These labor recruitment programs are typically state-sponsored and coercive assignments of impoverished people in low-skill/low-wage jobs, often against their will,” the report says.
The company also benefited from a state-run effort that directed an entire village of Xinjiang farmers to hand their land over to a cooperative, which then grew marigolds and other crops for the company, the report said.
“Villagers are not given the opportunity to reject these terms or retain their lands,” the researchers wrote.
Pei-Lin Wu contributed to this report.
