US Firm Drops Ties With Xinjiang Supplier

A US supplier of T-shirts and other team apparel to university book shops has cut ties with a Chinese company that drew workers from a Xinjiang internment camp.

Last month, an Associated Press investigation tracked shipments from a Hetian Taida Apparel factory inside an internment camp to Badger Sportswear, a leading supplier in Statesville, North Carolina.

In a statement posted to its website, Badger said on Wednesday it would no longer do business with Hetian Taida, nor import any goods from the region "given the controversy around doing business" there.

"Furthermore, we will not ship any product sourced from Hetian Taida currently in our possession," the company said, adding that the supplier accounted for about one percent of Badger's total annual sales.

Repeated calls to Hetian Taida's chairman, Wu Hongbo, rang unanswered on Wednesday. In a previous conversation with the AP, Wu said while Hetian Taida was located in the same compound as one camp that the government calls a "vocational skills education and training centre," Hetian Taida was not involved in the camp's activities.

However, Wu said his company employed 20 to 30 "trainees" from the centre as part of the region's efforts to alleviate poverty.

Asked about the case, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said on Thursday that while the ministry doesn't generally comment on individual business decisions, Badger appeared to have been acting on "misinformation."

As many as one million Uyghur and Kazakh Muslims are thought to be held in internment camps in Xinjiang.(AP)