Australia urged to pass Magnitsky human rights law or risk becoming haven for dirty money
"China expands mass labour program to Tibet, forcing farmers into factories"
Sanctions against countries often hurt ordinary citizens more that those who deserve to be sanctioned. Targeted sanctions are the way to go.
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Bill Browder, the man behind laws targeting human rights abusers with individual sanctions, says Australia should follow US and UK
The US financier Bill Browder has urged Australia to pass its version of the Magnitsky Act, targeting human rights abusers with individual sanctions. Photograph: Robin van Lonkhuijsen/EPA
Ben Doherty @bendohertycorroMon 17 Feb 2020 20.52 AEDT
Last modified on Tue 18 Feb 2020 10.40 AEDT
The man who spearheaded the United States’ Magnitsky Act – targeting sanctions against human rights violators around the world – has told Australia it risks becoming “a magnet for dirty money” from abusers and kleptocrats across the globe unless it brings in similar legislation.
US financier Bill Browder, who championed the targeted sanctions laws in the US and around the world, said Australia’s new law should be named after his former lawyer Sergei Magnitsky.
“These types of individuals keep their money in the west, where property rights and rule of law exists. This led to the idea of the Magnitsky Act, which freezes assets and bans visas of human rights violators.”
The United States passed the Sergei Magnitsky Accountability Act in 2012, expanding it in 2016. The US government has since imposed sanctions on 94 individuals and 102 entities from 24 countries, including South Sudan, Uganda, Iraq and Cambodia.
Nine jurisdictions have adopted Magnitsky-like legislation, and the European Union is considering an almost identical act.
“As a champion of human rights and anticorruption in the Asia Pacific”, Australia should do so too, Browder told the joint standing committee on defence, foreign affairs and trade.
“As an integral member of the Five Eyes, it would make sense for Australia to follow in the footsteps of the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada. If Australia does not have its own Magnitsky Act, the country is at risk of becoming a magnet for dirty money from human rights abusers and kleptocrats from around the world.”
In December the foreign affairs minister, Marise Payne, asked the committee to conduct an inquiry into introducing legislation .. https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Joint/Foreign_Affairs_Defence_and_Trade/MagnitskyAct .. allowing for visa and property-related sanctions to be imposed on foreign individuals responsible for human rights violations, and those “who have materially assisted, sponsored or resourced significant corruption”.
US state department officials met bureaucrats from Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade in Canberra last week to discuss the proposal.
The legislative proposal has significant support across the political divide, but the Australian government has previously said its current regime – with autonomous sanctions and a “character test” as part of its visa laws – was sufficient.
Australian QC Geoffrey Robertson, who represented Browder in a Magnitsky-related defamation case, told parliament in a separate submission that “Australia should not only have a Magnitsky law, but take this opportunity to have the best Magnitsky law .. https://uploads.guim.co.uk/2020/02/17/1_Sub_-_Geoffrey_Robertson.r.pdf ”.
“I believe an effective Magnitsky law should apply to families of human rights violators – parents they pay to send abroad for hospital treatment and children they wish to send to expensive private schools and universities.
“If Australia’s law were to encompass grand-scale corruption, then it ought to apply to corporations as well as to individuals, not only by permitting listing of directors and major shareholders, but enabling companies themselves to be removed from registers and prohibited from trading.”
“The Australian government should join other governments and pass a law that specifies human rights and corruption as criteria in applying targeted sanctions.”
Pearson argued that with the US, Canada and the UK all implementing Magnitsky laws, collective action could be far more powerful in deterring human rights abusers.
“Telling rights violators in other countries that they can’t travel to Australia or put their money in Australian banks can have a real impact,” Pearson said. “By joining other countries with similar laws, Australia will be sending a strong message to abusive leaders everywhere that there are far-reaching consequences for their actions.”
New evidence of Uighur forced labour in China’s cotton industry - BBC News
"China expands mass labour program to Tibet, forcing farmers into factories"
•Dec 14, 2020
BBC News
Hundreds of thousands of people from ethnic minorities, including the Uighur community, are being forced by the Chinese authorities to pick cotton, in the far western region of Xinjiang, according to information seen by the BBC.
The evidence suggests that China's cotton crop - a fifth of the world’s supply - could be far more dependent on forced labour than previously thought.
Over the past few years more than a million Uighurs are believed to have been detained in so-called ‘re-education' camps. China denies claims of torture and carrying out forced sterilisations and abortions.
In response to the latest evidence the Chinese government has told the BBC that claims of forced labour are “entirely fabricated”.
Huw Edwards presents a BBC News at Ten special investigation from John Sudworth in Xinjiang - a region where foreign journalists are closely monitored.
Boohoo, H&M and Nike deny Uighur forced labour allegations
Published 5 November
Boohoo has denied that its materials come from suppliers using forced Uighur labour
Fashion brands including Boohoo, H&M and Nike have denied using products made with the forced labour of Uighur Muslims in China.
The brands, which included The North Face, were speaking to MPs conducting an inquiry.
The House of Commons business committee questioned whether Boohoo was on top of its supply chain.
Earlier this year the retailer investigated reports of exploitation and unsafe conditions at UK suppliers.
There have been a number of reports alleging that thousands of Muslims from China's Uighur minority group are working under coercive conditions at factories that supply some of the world's biggest brands.
Andrew Reaney, group director of responsible sourcing at Boohoo, told MPs at the Business, Energy and Industry Strategy (Beis) committee he was "shocked" by the reports.
"We were quite shocked by the revelations around the Uighurs and what's happening in the Xinjiang province.
"We wrote to all our suppliers across the supply chain to confirm that we have no manufacturing or fabric links to that particular region.
"That was done and all of our suppliers confirmed that they have no manufacturing or fabric links to that region."
Mr Reaney said that the online retailer does "not knowingly source any yarn or fabric" from the region, as MPs questioned auditing processes at the business following the row over working conditions in its UK supply chain.
Last month, the company published its full report by Alison Levitt QC, which identified "many failings" but freed it from allegations of deliberately allowing poor conditions and low pay for garment workers.
"It's a matter of regret from the organisation that we obviously didn't move as fast as we could have," Mr Reaney said.
Workers walk by the perimeter fence of what is officially known as a vocational skills education centre in Dabancheng in Xinjiang in September 2018 Reuters
China has already detained about a million Uighurs at internment camps, punishing and indoctrinating them.
Officials said the camps are aimed at countering extremism.
Between 2017 and 2019, the ASPI think tank estimates that more than 80,000 Uighurs were transferred out of the far western Xinjiang autonomous region to work in factories across China. It said some were sent directly from detention camps.
ASPI said the Uighurs were moved through labour transfer schemes operating under a central government policy known as Xinjiang Aid.
According to the report, the factories claimed to be part of the supply chain for 83 well-known global brands, including Nike, Apple and Dell.
[YouTube of embedded video]
The BBC's John Sudworth meets Uighur parents in Turkey who say their children are missing in China
David Savman, head of supply chain at H&M, said the Swedish-based retail group worked with accreditation groups for its supply chain which no longer use cotton from the region following the allegations.
"When these serious allegations came up we made investigations into all of our suppliers," he told MPs.
"We didn't find any proof of any breach of our sustainability commitments, where we have very clear guidance of how our ethical processes should happen."
Later in the committee session, Jaycee Pribulsky, vice president of global footwear sourcing and manufacturing at Nike, said the US group was "deeply concerned" regarding the situation in the Chinese region.
She told MPs: "Nike does not source any raw cotton. And regarding Xinjiang, Nike has confirmed with its suppliers that there are no spun yarns or textiles manufactured in the area in our products."
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