More foreign retail brands have been criticised on Chinese social media on Thursday soon after Beijing’s propaganda offensive against Sweden’s H&M sparked by the company’s expression of concern about labour circumstances in Xinjiang.
Earlier this week, China denied allegations of human rights abuses by its officials in the western area of Xinjiang soon after the European Union, United States, Britain and Canada imposed sanctions on the officials.
Beijing hit back with retaliatory sanctions on European lawmakers, scholars and institutions.
Chinese state media singled out H&M on Wednesday for a statement that was reported by media final year in which the Swedish retailer stated it was deeply concerned by reports of accusations of forced labour in Xinjiang, and that it did not supply items from the Chinese area.
It was unclear why the H&M statement was back in the public eye.
A social media frenzy ignited by a government contact to cease foreign brands from tainting China’s name prompted net customers to search for other previously issued statements on Xinjiang by foreign retailers.
Brands targeted by Internet customers integrated Nike Inc, which in an undated statement stated it was “concerned” about reports of forced labour, as did German sportswear firm Adidas.
Some net customers stated they would cease obtaining Nike and will help nearby brands such as Li Ning and Anta, whilst other folks told Adidas to leave China.
Shares of Anta Sports Products Ltd jumped more than 6% in Hong Kong on Thursday soon after issuing a statement saying it would continue to use cotton from Xinjiang. Li Ning Co’s shares surged by more than 7%.
State tabloid Global Times reported that Spain’s Inditex , owner of Zara, had “quietly removed” a statement on Xinjiang cotton from its English and Spanish-language web sites on Thursday.
Inditex did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.
BOYCOTT
Internet customers also targeted the Better Cotton Initiative (BCI), a worldwide group that promotes sustainable cotton production which stated in October it was suspending its approval of cotton sourced from Xinjiang for the 2020-2021 season, citing issues more than human rights.
BCI members involve Nike, Adidas, H&M and Japan’s Fast Retailing.
“If you boycott Xinjiang cotton, we’ll boycott you. Either Adidas quits BCI, or get out of China,” one net user wrote.
Nike, Adidas and the BCI did not instantly respond to requests for comment.
In response to the furore, H&M stated on Wednesday it respected Chinese buyers and that it was committed to extended-term investment and improvement in China.
But by Thursday morning, H&M did not exist on some Chinese retailer locator maps. Searches for H&M shops on Baidu Maps yielded no benefits. The Swedish clothes retailer’s official retailer on Alibaba’s Tmall, an e-commerce platform, was inaccessible.
At a each day media briefing at the Chinese foreign ministry, spokeswoman Hua Chunying, when asked about H&M, held up a photograph of Black Americans selecting cotton.
“This was in the U.S. when Black slaves were forced to pick cotton in the fields,” she stated.
Hua then held up a second photograph of cotton fields in Xinjiang.
“More than 40% of the cotton in Xinjiang is harvested by machinery, so the alleged forced labour is non-existent.”
Overnight, People’s Daily, the primary newspaper of the Communist Party, rolled out a social media campaign in help of cotton sourced from Xinjiang.
The graphic “I support Xinjiang cotton” posted by the newspaper on the Twitter-like microblog Weibo has considering that attracted about 2.2 million likes.
Japanese retailer Muji, owned by Ryohin Keikaku Co, told the Global Times on Thursday that it is a user of Xinjiang cotton, winning praise from Chinese net customers, who lauded the firm’s “survival instincts”.
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