Forced Uyghur Labor Behind World's Solar Panels, Investigation Finds

British researchers say the world's production of solar panels is being fueled by forced labor from Uyghur Muslims in the Chinese province of Xinjiang.

An investigation by Sheffield Hallam University says some 45 percent of the world's supply of a key component in the panels-polysilicon-comes from Xinjiang and is obtained through a vast system of coercion involving the Uyghur ethnic minority.

In Broad Daylight, the report from the university's Helena Kennedy Center for International Justice, says the world's four biggest panel manufacturers use polysilicon tainted by forced labor, and urges producers to source the substance from elsewhere.

"However, significant evidence-largely drawn from government and corporate sources-reveals that labor transfers are deployed in the Uyghur Region within an environment of unprecedented coercion, undergirded by the constant threat of re-education and internment."

It said all polysilicon manufacturers in the Uyghur region had "Reported their participation in labor transfer programs and/or are supplied by raw materials companies that have."

The report's authors said they had "Investigated the entire solar module supply chain from quartz to panel" to better understand the extent to which forced labor in Xinjiang affected international solar panel supply chains, in order to "Provide stakeholders with the evidence base upon which to judge risk of exposure to forced labor."

China has drawn increasing international condemnation over its treatment of Uyghur Muslims, including allegations of mass detentions and human rights abuses including forced labor and the forcible sterilization of women.
 

https://www.theepochtimes.com/forced-uyghur-labor-behind-worlds-solar-panels-investigation-finds_3816684.html