UHRP Report Sparks UK Parliamentarians to Call on IHG to Explain Expansion in Uyghur Region Amid Atrocity Crimes
May 9, 2025 | 10:00 a.m. EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact: Peter Irwin +1 (646) 906-7722, Omer Kanat +1 (202) 790-1795
A group of UK Parliamentarians from the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC) has issued a joint letter to the CEO of InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), raising alarm over the company’s expanding footprint in East Turkistan, where Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples are subjected to crimes against humanity and acts of genocide.
The letter, supported by MPs and Peers from across party lines, cites evidence of widespread human rights violations in the region, as well as motions passed by the UK Parliament “recognising the persecution of Uyghurs in Xinjiang as constituting genocide and crimes against humanity.” The parliamentarians note in the letter: “Given growing legal and reputational risks associated with corporate presence in Xinjiang, we strongly urge your company to reassess your operations in the region.”
The parliamentarians call on IHG to provide urgent clarification on its business dealings in the Uyghur Region, particularly regarding potential ties to the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps (XPCC)—a paramilitary entity sanctioned by the United States, United Kingdom, European Union, and Canada.
The letter follows the release of a UHRP report—by Peter Irwin, Henryk Szadziewski, Ben Carrdus, and an anonymous researcher—which identifies at least four IHG-branded hotels currently operating in the Uyghur Region and plans for sixteen more in the coming years. Two of the company’s properties are located in areas controlled by the internationally-sanctioned XPCC.
In addition to highlighting IHG’s hotel expansion, the report, It Does Matter Where You Stay: International Hotel Chains in East Turkistan, identified at least 115 internationally-branded hotels operational as of April 2025, and at least another 74 hotels planned by Accor, Hilton, Hyatt, IHG, Marriott, Minor Hotels, and Wyndham. UHRP warned that ongoing business operations in the region risks complicity in widespread and systematic human rights abuses by the Chinese government.
UHRP has called on international hotel chains to immediately freeze expansion, end all operations, and publicly disclose their exit from the Uyghur Region; conduct transparent due diligence to avoid complicity in abuses; and engage with Uyghur civil society—while urging governments to investigate possible sanctions violations by hotels and booking platforms operating in XPCC-administered areas.
“We are deeply concerned that a major British company is expanding operations in a region where atrocity crimes are ongoing,” said Peter Irwin, UHRP’s Associate Director for Research and Advocacy. “In such an environment, foreign businesses are at a high risk of complicity in those abuses. IHG must explain how it can operate in Xinjiang without being linked to human rights abuses.”
The operation of international hotel chains in East Turkistan has raised alarms previously. In 2021, UHRP Executive Director, Omer Kanat, responding to reports that Hilton was building a hotel on the site of a demolished mosque, said: “A Hampton Inn logo on that spot would be a giant seal of approval on the genocide. There is simply no justification for Hilton to benefit from the destruction of Uyghur mosques across our homeland.” The hotel has since opened.
The joint letter poses several pointed questions to IHG, including whether the company has conducted robust human rights due diligence, assessed links to sanctioned entities, and consulted with independent Uyghur civil society organizations.
Signatories to the letter include Sir Iain Duncan Smith MP, Blair McDougall MP, Chris Law MP, Alex Sobel MP, Marie Rimmer MP, Lord Shinkwin, Baroness Meyer of Nine Elms, Baroness D’Souza, and Lord Mackinlay.