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Walk Free
Overview
China’s central role in global production – it is the world’s largest exporter of goods1 – is a cause for concern as exports from China are increasingly at risk of being tainted by state-imposed forced labour. Since 2018, evidence of forced labour of Uyghur and other Turkic and Muslim majority peoples has emerged in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (Uyghur Region).2 Forced labour imposed by private actors is also reported, in addition to forced marriage and organ trafficking, with vulnerability primarily driven by discriminatory government practices. While China demonstrated some efforts to tackle modern slavery through sustained coordination at the national and regional levels – including by adopting a new national action plan for 2021 to 20303 – its overall response is critically undermined by the use of state-imposed forced labour.
Prevalence
The 2023 Global Slavery Index (GSI) estimates that 5.8 million people were living in modern slavery in China on any given day in 2021. This equates to four in every thousand people in the country, which places China at 19 out of 27 countries in the region. It is second only to India when the estimated number of people living in modern slavery is considered. This estimate does not include figures on organ trafficking, which evidence indicates does occur in China.
Forced labour
State-imposed forced labour
Since the 2018 GSI, evidence of systematic oppression and pervasive state-imposed forced labour of Uyghurs and other Turkic and Muslim majority peoples has emerged.4 Forced labour is exacted by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) as a means of racial and religious discrimination; political coercion and education; and as punishment for holding views ideologically opposed to the state.5 It is reported alongside mass surveillance, political indoctrination, religious oppression,6 forced separation of families,7 forced sterilisation,8 torture, sexual violence,9 and arbitrary detention in so-called “re-education camps” within the Uyghur Region.10
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Forced labour exploitation
Forced labour exploitation of citizens and foreign migrants is also imposed by the private economy, including in factories, brick kilns, coal mines, fishing, domestic servitude, and forced begging.27 Since the 2018, reports of forced labour of students placed into production line jobs masked as internships have continued, with cases recorded in automobile28 and electronics factories.29 Forced labour and abuse is also well-documented in the fishing sector,30 including on distant water longline fleets,31 Ghanaian flagged industrial trawl fleets operated by Chinese corporations,32 and Chinese vessels fishing illegally in Somali waters.33 Fishers have reported experiencing wage withholding, food deprivation, physical and sexual violence, restricted movement, and debt bondage, and other abuses at sea.34
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Forced commercial sexual exploitation of adults
Sex work is criminalised in China,40 yet Chinese and foreign women and children are reportedly trafficked for sexual exploitation within the sex industry.41
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Commercial sexual exploitation of children
Perpetrators similarly subject children to commercial sexual exploitation (CSEC) in China. North Korean girls as young as nine are reportedly forced into online commercial sexual exploitation in China.45 Girls from other neighbouring countries such as Lao PDR46 and Vietnam47 are also trafficked to China for sexual exploitation. While less is known about the experiences of boys, Mongolian boys are reportedly vulnerable to being trafficked across the Chinese border for forced labour and sexual exploitation.48
Forced marriage
Forced marriage in China is fuelled by the skewed ratio of men to women – a result of the controversial one-child policy implemented between 1979 and 2015 that led to nearly 21 million “missing women.”49 This generated a demand for brides and a surge in the marriage brokering profession – a trade that has drawn human traffickers: women are trafficked from neighbouring countries such as Myanmar,50 Vietnam,51 Pakistan,52 Lao PDR,53 and Cambodia54 to fulfil the bride shortage. Forced marriage may lead to other forms of exploitation, including domestic servitude, forced labour,55 and forced sexual exploitation.56 Forced surrogacy and trafficking of pregnant women to China to sell their babies has also been observed.57
Read the rest:
https://www.walkfree.org/global-slavery-index/country-studies/china/
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