70 Uyghur groups ask for urgent action on Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act

Untitled design (8)

September 9, 2020

Speaker Nancy Pelosi
House of Representatives
United States Congress

Leader Mitch McConnell
Senate
United States Congress

70 Uyghur groups appeal for swift action on the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act

Dear Speaker Pelosi and Leader McConnell:

As members of the Uyghur diaspora all over the world, we ask you to act urgently to pass the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (H.R.6210 and S.3471).

Your leadership is needed to end the complicity of companies and consumers in the Chinese government’s human rights crimes against the Uyghur people. American consumers should not be put in the position of potentially supporting crimes against humanity every time they buy a face mask or any other product with a supply-chain tainted by Uyghur forced labor.

We are enduring our fourth year as victims of a vast genocidal campaign of repression: torture and death in concentration camps and prisons, separation of families, the destruction of our mosques, cemeteries and neighborhoods throughout our homeland, and the extraction of our people’s biometric data for surveillance and for China’s plan to achieve global preeminence in machine-learning and artificial intelligence.

Nine months ago, in December 2019, Regional officials suddenly announced that Uyghurs had “graduated” from the “vocational” concentration camps and had “found jobs.” Now we know that these “jobs” are actually a vast scheme of slave labor extracted from a terrorized people. We appeal to you to act now to stop American businesses’ profits from being contaminated by participation in these shocking crimes, to protect American consumers from being forced into possible complicity whenever they buy products from China.

The inmates in these forced-labor factories are our parents, our children and grandchildren, our brothers and sisters, cousins and aunts and uncles, our classmates, our teachers, our neighbors, our business partners. Our poets, musicians, writers, religious scholars, professors, and entrepreneurs—the cultural, intellectual, and business leaders of our society⁠—have all disappeared.

We are ready to testify at any hearings and provide any further documentation you may need.

Above all, we ask you not to delay. Your action now will ensure Uyghurs’ gratitude forever. We are counting on America, our beacon of hope, to act to stop private businesses from profiting from the slave labor of Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz and other Turkic and majority-Muslim peoples of East Turkistan. If America acts, there is hope that other countries will follow.

Respectfully yours,

Omer Kanat
Executive Director, Uyghur Human Rights Project
202.790.1795 (m)  kanato@uhrp.orgwww.uhrp.org

For:

Uyghur Human Rights Project
Uyghur American Association
Campaign for Uyghurs
Uyghur Academy America
Uyghur Relief Fund
World Uyghur Congress
Japan Uyghur Association
Norwegian Uyghur Committee (NUK)
East Turkistan Association of Canada
East Turkestan Union in Europe
Sweden Uyghur Education Association
Uyghur Mothers’ Union in Germany
Uyghur Collective
UK Uyghur Community
Uyghur Support Group Netherlands
Uyghur Association of Victoria
Austria Uyghur Association
Belgium Uyghur Association
Suomen Ita Turkestan Yhdistys (Finland East Turkistan Association)
Uyghur Aid
Association des Ouïghours de France (Association of French Uyghurs)
Arzu Uigurischer Kuturverein e.V. (Arzu Uyghur Cultural Association)
Doğu Türkistan Kültür Merkezi Duisburg (East Turkistan Cultural Center Duisburg)
East Turkistan Information Center
East Turkistan Union in Europe
Qutatqu Bilik Institute
Eastern Turkistan Uyghur Association in the Netherlands
Uyghur Radio TV
Sweden East Turkistan Education Association
Sweden Mahmut Kashgeri Mother Tongue School
Uigurischer Veren Schweiz (Swiss Uyghur Association)
Uyghur Academy Europe
Uighur U.K. Association
Bishkek Human Rights Committee
Ittipak Uyghur Society of the Kyrgyz Republic
Society Union of Uyghur National Association
Uyghur Youth Union in Kazakhstan
Uzbekistan Uyghur Culture Center
Pakistan Ömer Uyghur Foundation
Canada East Turkestan Union
Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project
Alberta Uyghur Association
Australian Uyghur Association
Australian East Turkestan Association
East Turkistan National Council
East Turkistan Cultural and Solidarity Association
Uyghur Academy Australia
Shukr Foundation
Uyghur Research Institute
Doğu Türkistan Maarif ve Dayanimsa Derneği (East Turkistan Education and Solidarity Association)
Uyghur Academy
Isa Yusuf Alptekin Foundation
East Turkistan Foundation
Dutch Uyghur, Tibet, Mongol People Cooperation Organization
Doğu Türkistan Gençlik Derneği (East Turkistan Youth Association)
Doğu Türkistan Yeni Nesil Hareketi Derneği (East Turkistan New Generation Movement)
Doğu Türkistan Nuzugum Kültür ve Aile Derneği (Nuzugum Culture and Family Centre)
Uiguriska Utbildingsföreningen (Uyghur Education Association)
East Turkistan Human Rights Watch Association
Doğu Türkistan Spor ve Gelişim Derneği (East Turkistan Sports and Development Association)
Dutch Uyghur Human Rights Foundation
East Turkistan Art & Science Institute
Doğu Türkistan Muhacirlar Derneği (East Turkistan Immigrants Association)
Doğu Türkistan Basin ve Medya Derneği (East Turkistan Press and Media Association)
Australian Uyghur Tangritagh Women’s Association
Uyghur Solidarity Campaign
Uyghur Transitional Justice Database
Daniye Uyghur Jama’itining Wekili (Denmark Uyghur Association)
Uyghur Refugee Relief Fund
Darman Foundation