The US customs agency has banned all goods made by the Chinese sportswear giant Li-Ning, accusing the company of using North Korean labour in its supply chain, a violation of US sanctions.
It is the latest move from Washington to crack down on China’s apparel sector over suspected human rights abuses, this time under the authority of a five-year-old sanctions law targeting Pyongyang.
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The US has cracked down hard on the Chinese apparel sector in recent years, but most of that has been related to suspected human rights abuses in China’s far-west Xinjiang region, where Beijing is accused of committing crimes against humanity, including mass detentions and forced labour against the region’s Uygurs and other ethnic minority groups.
Washington has also accused Beijing of committing genocide in the region. The Chinese government denies any rights abuses, and says it is helping provide job skills to the region’s ethnic minority population.
A law that essentially bans all Xinjiang goods from entering the US passed earlier this year.
Li-Ning has also been entangled in the controversies surrounding Xinjiang. Amid a public backlash against other companies that had spoken out about suspected rights abuses in the region, Li-Ning has said it uses Xinjiang cotton.
Li-Ning is one of China’s most famous home-grown apparel brands – it is named after the Olympic gymnast who founded the company – but has a vastly smaller presence in the US.
The company has made some inroads with sponsorships in the NBA. The retired basketball star Dwyane Wade’s “Way of Wade” clothing line, for example, is produced in partnership with Li-Ning.
This article was first published in Asia One . All contents and images are copyright to their respective owners and sources.
