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China accused of forcing 570k people to pick cotton in Xinjiang

reuters.com

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Re: China accused of forcing 570k people to pick cotton in Xinjiang

#21

Post by dirtyid »

46ve18v wrote: post #6

Thats not picked by machines ?

Almost all north XJ cotton is picked mechanically, around 70% of XJ output. Why? Because XJ gdp / labour cost increased so much that labour is increasingly uncompetitive. Hence 4000% increase in orders of John Deere cotton picking machines, followed by US sanctions on John Deere to make sure XJ relies on manual labour so US/Zenz can keep driving the slave labour narrative. The 30% in South XJ is still hand picked, much poorer and rural region where manual labour is feasible. BTW XJ cotton is heavily subsidized (transportation mainly), it's basically a jobs program (i.e. poverty alleviation). The idea that XPCC depends on slave labour for XJ cotton is stupid for the simple reason that it's much cheaper to not pick cotton at all. And even Zenz hitpiece does not find examples that these are anything but competitively paid positions relative to local wages, which is still significantly higher than bottom 40% in China, there are over 500M+ Han from other provinces willing to work for XJ south poverty alleviation wages.

Completely unrelated is US and India are the other largest cotton producers, one of which as record of forced child labour for ~10 years.

Re: China accused of forcing 570k people to pick cotton in Xinjiang

#23

Post by bloak »

Vaguely related, in that it involves harvesting cotton in Asia: Turkmenistan uses "forced labour" for the cotton harvest. As I understand it, they need a huge number of people for 2-3 months, so people get drafted in. From the point of view of human rights I suppose it's no worse than a compulsory military service. (Or am I missing something?) Nevertheless, many people would prefer not to buy that cotton or clothes made from it, and perhaps such products shouldn't be sold internationally at all.

Re: China accused of forcing 570k people to pick cotton in Xinjiang

#24

Post by hungryhobo »

DoofusOfDeath wrote: post #14
fennecfoxen wrote: post #2

[flagged]

I'm pretty uninformed on this topic. Can some explain why the parent comment would get downvoted?

Well perhaps that's not really Beijing's narrative? But an attempt at creating a you are either with us it against us narrative? Same thing was used when us went to war with Iraq but look where we are.

Re: China accused of forcing 570k people to pick cotton in Xinjiang

#25

Post by thefounder »

For some reasons I thought more or less forced labor has always been part of the communist doctrine.

You are suppossed to always have a job whether you like it or not. The Xjinjiang thing brings this to a new level but I'm not entirely surprised.

When were the dissidents treated fairly in communist systems?

Re: China accused of forcing 570k people to pick cotton in Xinjiang

#26

Post by logotype »

dirtyid wrote: post #15

1. Article from Dec 2020. 2. Center for Global Policy rebranded Newlines (funded by a private university with only 120 students that has thinktank and publishing arm), aka another front used to launder Zenz studies. 3. Basically rehash of Zenz Jamestown hit piece, the 500K was based off CCP press releases of rural transfer programs. Literally misconstruing official CCP media bragging about poverty alleviation into co…

Warning: account affiliated with the CCP

Re: China accused of forcing 570k people to pick cotton in Xinjiang

#27

Post by cdmckay »

A US-based think tank releases a report accusing a rival of genocide. I would be highly suspicious of this and look at it carefully.

For example, it’s authored by Adrian Zenz, a religious zealot who feels “led by God” to research Chinese minority groups. If you dig into his research and his credentials, it’s all pretty flimsy.

But, it fits the narrative the US would like to have about China, so everyone eats it up uncritically.

Re: China accused of forcing 570k people to pick cotton in Xinjiang

#28

Post by _tik_ »

genera1 wrote: post #13

Oh come on, it's another piece of Adrian Zenz disinformation

I checked Adrian Zenz on wikipedia. Zenz is a born-again Christian, and has stated that he feels "led by God" in his research on Chinese minority groups.

He wrote report on Tibetan forced labour too. Quite an interesting source of news by Reuters

Re: China accused of forcing 570k people to pick cotton in Xinjiang

#29

Post by nradov »

newbie578 wrote: post #9

The situation with China is going to be the greatest challenge of the 21st century.. Although, when I say China, I mean the CCP, it is unfortunate but most people today equate China with CCP. I really don't know what is the best solution, and what we as a western community can do to make changes. It seems to me that China won't change until it changes itself from the inside, if it will ever even happen..

One option is to dust off the Cold War playbook for how we dealt with the USSR. Set up alliances and trade sanctions to choke their economy. Bait then into arms races and proxy wars to drain their wealth. Conduct covert operations and propaganda to foster internal dissent. And then wait patiently for the CCP to destroy itself. But there's no guarantee that will actually work; we're in for a rough time.
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