A new report says major Chinese producers of critical minerals are using state-imposed forced labor programs in the Uyghur region to meet rising global demand, putting international brands they export to at risk of complicity in human rights violations.
According to the report by Hague-based rights group Global Rights Compliance, 77 companies and downstream manufacturers of critical minerals-based products operate in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR), placing them at risk of participation in the labor transfer programs in the lithium, titanium, beryllium, and magnesium industries.
The findings are likely to add to the due diligence concerns of foreign and multinational companies that source those products. Forced labor is on a long list of serious human rights problems that have been documented in Xinjiang, where the U.S. government determined in 2021 that China was committing genocide against the Uyghurs.
The Uyghur region is a major source of four critical minerals. It is the top source of beryllium, crucial for nuclear applications and advanced electronics, and one of the five province-level jurisdictions that produces raw magnesium. The region is also seeing a surge in lithium exploration, mining, and battery production to feed the electric vehicle industry, and accounts for 11.6% of the world’s titanium sponge, a key input in titanium metal that is used in aerospace and defense.
Over the past decade, Beijing has expanded exploration, mining, processing and manufacturing of critical minerals in the XUAR, transforming the region into a major “extractive hub,” Global Rights Compliance said in its report titled “Risk at the Source: Critical Mineral Supply Chains and State-Imposed Forced Labor in the Uyghur Region.”
