VW boss Herbert Diess defends the Group's car factory in the Chinese region of Xinjiang.
There is no forced labor in the factory.
But the debate is not subsiding.
Business in China: VW defends production in the Xinjiang region.
VW CEO Diess: There is no forced labor in the joint venture plant in Urumqi.
Re-education camps and forced labor in Xinjiang are increasingly dominating the debate about how to deal with China.
Hanover / Urumqi - The VW Group has again defended its business in the northwestern Chinese region of Xinjiang - despite reports of human rights violations against the Muslim Uyghurs.
"We stand by our commitment in China, including in Xinjang," said CEO Herbert Diess of the
Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung
.
One of his arguments: the company's presence is also good for the people in China.
"Our presence on site contributes to an improvement rather than a move away." VW is certain that no forced laborers will be deployed for VW production in Xinjiang, said Diess.
VW operates a plant in the provincial capital Urumqi together with its joint venture partner SAIC.
In addition to VW, the Dax group BASF also produces in the region.
The Volkswagen plant was also the subject of TV satirist Jan Böhmermann at the end of 2020.
The situation of the predominantly Muslim Uyghurs has meanwhile become a central question for the governments in Europe and North America for their future dealings with China.
It is also increasingly involved in important decisions, such as the EU's investment agreement with China or the Olympic Winter Games in Beijing scheduled for February 2022.
In his first telephone conversation with his counterpart Xi Jinping, the new US President Joe Biden counted the human rights violations in Xinjiang as one of the issues that worried him.
Mike Pompeo, foreign minister of Donald Trump's previous government, even spoke of "genocide".
Like the EU, Biden has not yet adopted this word.
Nobody has accused China of the mass murder of Uyghurs so far.
In this context, it is more about reports that there should be forced sterilization of Uyghur women or about forced assimilation of the Uyghurs into Chinese culture.
China: Reports of massive internment of Uyghurs in re-education camps and forced labor
The Consortium of Investigative Journalists (CIJ) published Chinese documents in November that show a systematic persecution of the Uyghurs and instructions for the mass internment of the Muslim minority.
According to several reports, up to a million Uighurs are said to have been interned in re-education camps.
There are also credible reports that Uyghurs are regularly obliged to perform forced labor in the region's cotton fields.
China rejects the allegations and describes the camps as "training centers" for Uyghurs and other minorities.
"Helping people of all ethnic groups to find safe work is very different from forced labor," said Foreign Office spokesman Wang Wenbin once at a press conference.
China lifted three million people in Xinjiang out of poverty.
The reports on the subject, however, do not stop.
In addition to cotton, the focus is now also on solar cells - more precisely the pre-product polysilicon for photovoltaic cells, which is produced in large quantities in Xinjiang.
Around 95 percent of all photovoltaic cells sold on the world market contain
material from Xinjiang
, according to
Bloomberg New Energy Finance
.
These solar cells are also entering the EU market.
Jörg Wuttke, President of the EU Chamber of Commerce in China, expects the EU to tighten controls on imports from Xinjiang, including solar panels To convey a message - for example the screening of imported products, "said Wuttke the US news portal
Politico
.
The China Photovoltaic Industry Association denies allegations that there is forced labor in the sector.
China / Xinjiang: EU Parliament discusses import bans in the event of human rights violations
With a view to Xinjiang, the EU Parliament is currently discussing the possibility of imposing import bans in the event of serious human rights violations.
After a long dispute, the Union and the SPD agreed on the draft of a supply chain law on Friday.
According to this, large German companies should in future ensure that human rights are observed along their global supply chain.
Due to the pollution caused by the corona pandemic, it should not come into force until 2023.
VW boss Diess: No forced labor at the VW plant in Xinjiang
After all, VW produces itself in Xinjiang, which enables better control.
“Neither we nor our suppliers employ forced labor.
Here we have zero tolerance.
We also uphold our values in Xinjiang, including employee representation, respect for minorities and social and labor standards, ”said Diess.
A “social charter” at VW is intended to ensure that binding internal rules comply with human rights in the Group's global plant network and in all business contacts with suppliers.
A response from the state government of Lower Saxony to a request from the Greens, which became known in January, revealed that the group had no evidence of human rights violations.
Around one in four of the 650 employees belong to minorities - that corresponds to the proportion of minorities in the population of the city of Urumqi.
The VW group sells more than 40 percent of its cars in China.
CEO Diess generally justifies doing business in autocratically governed states: According to the
Economist,
only 5.7 percent of the world's population lived
in a democracy “as we know it,” said Diess: “If we were only active in these countries, we and everyone else would have it Global companies no longer exist. ”The debate will continue.
(ck / with dpa)
