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A30 world news
Diasabra 27 Maart 2021

China erasing H&M from internet amid Xinjiang backlash

on Taiwan, Tibet and other zar said she “resolutely re-
sensitive issues. sists all attempts to discredit
China.”
Most comply because China
is one of the biggest, fastest- Singers Eason Chan and
growing markets for global Angelababy of Hong Kong
fashion, electronics and other announced they were break-
consumer brands. ing ties with Adidas. Actress
Zhou Dongyu split from
China is H&M’s fourth-larg- Burberry. Actors Ni Ni and
est market behind Germany, Jing Boran broke with Uniq-
the United States and Britain lo.
and accounted about 5% of
2020 revenue. Song Qian, a singer and for-
mer member of the Korean
Greater China is Nike Inc.’s pop group f(x) who also is
third-largest market after known as Victoria Song,
North America and Europe. and actor Huang Xuan an-
nounced earlier they were
Greater China accounted for ending endorsement deals
23% of Nike’s global sales in with H&M.
the quarter ending in Febru-
ary, compared with 36.5% for In Hong Kong, pro-Beijing
North America. But China lawmaker Regina Ip said in
revenue rose 51% over a year a Twitter post that she would
earlier as consumer demand stop buying Burberry, one of
rebounded from the corona- her favorite brands.
virus, while North American
(AP) — H&M disap- from a popular mobile phone camps in Xinjiang, accord- sales fell 10%. “I stand with my country in
peared from the internet game. ing to foreign governments boycotting companies that
in China as the govern- and researchers. Authorities An H&M outlet in Shanghai spread lies about Xinjiang,”
ment raised pressure on In a high-tech version of the there are accused of impos- had only a handful of cus- she said.
shoe and clothing brands airbrushing used by China ing forced labor and coercive tomers on Friday afternoon.
and announced sanctions and other authoritarian re- birth control measures. Not all brands have shunned
Friday against British of- gimes to delete political en- “I wasn’t aware of the back- Xinjiang sourcing.
ficials in a spiraling fight emies from historic photos, The Chinese government lash. I came here to buy a
over complaints of abuses H&M’s approximately 500 rejects complaints of abuses coat for spring because H&M South Korean athletic shoe
in the Xinjiang region. stores in China didn’t show and says the camps are for job is reasonably priced and fash- brand FILA said Friday the
up on ride-hailing app Didi training to support economic ionable,” said Wang Yuying, a company buys cotton from
H&M products were miss- Chuxing or map services op- development and combat Is- 52-year-old retiree who was Xinjiang and will keep doing
ing from major e-commerce erated by Alibaba and Baidu. lamic radicalism. shopping at the store. so.
platforms including Alibaba Its smartphone app disap- State media accused H&M
and JD.com following calls peared from app stores. and other brands of improp- “I’ll still buy something since On its social media account,
by state media for a boycott erly profiting from China I’m already here, but if this FILA China said it has started
over the Swedish retailer's It wasn’t clear whether com- while criticizing it. That backlash lasts for a really long the process of withdrawing
decision to stop buying cot- panies received orders to prompted Chinese retailers time, I will buy less from this from the Better Cotton Ini-
ton from Xinjiang. That erase H&M’s online pres- and internet companies to brand.” tiative, an industry group that
hurts H&M's ability to reach ence, but Chinese enterprises distance themselves from the promotes environmental and
customers in a country where are expected to fall in line Swedish retailer, though oth- A salesman, who asked not labor standards.
more than a fifth of shopping without being told. Regula- er brands still were available to be identified by name due
is online. tors have broad powers to on e-commerce platforms. to the sensitivity of the mat- H&M's announcement last
Shockwaves spread to other punish companies that fail to ter, said there were far fewer year that it no longer would
brands as dozens of celebrities support official policy. “It’s a form of self-preser- shoppers than on a normal use Xinjiang cotton cited the
called off endorsement deals vation,” said Shaun Rein, Friday. The salesman said he BCI's move to stop licensing
with Nike, Adidas, Burberry, The ruling Communist Par- managing director of China understood why consum- cotton from the region be-
Uniqlo and Lacoste after state ty's Youth League launched Market Research Group in ers were angry but said if the cause it was difficult to trace
media criticized the brands attacks Wednesday on H&M Shanghai. backlash continues, it will how it was produced.
for expressing concern about following the European hurt the livelihoods of local
Xinjiang. Union's decision to join the Rein said the outpouring of employees of the brands tar- It was unclear why the party
United States, Britain and anger at H&M is the harshest geted. targeted H&M, whose ex-
Brands are struggling to re- Canada in imposing sanc- he has seen against a foreign pression of concern about
spond to pressure abroad to tions on Chinese officials brand. He said companies are Two Burberry-designed Xinjiang was similar to that
distance themselves from blamed for abuses in Xinji- especially sensitive because character outfits in Tencent’s of other companies. But its
abuses without triggering ang. this comes at a time when popular Honor of Kings mo- home country of Sweden
Chinese retaliation and los- Chinese anti-monopoly and bile game were removed, the might be seen by Chinese
ing access to one of the big- On Friday, the Chinese gov- other regulators are stepping game's social media account leaders as more susceptible to
gest and fastest-growing mar- ernment announced penal- up scrutiny of internet opera- said Thursday. It gave no rea- pressure due to its small size.
kets. That pressure is rising ties against nine Britons and tors. son.
as human rights activists are four institutions. They are Relations between Beijing
lobbying sponsors to pull out banned from visiting China "If they don’t try to criticize, Celebrities including at least and Stockholm have been
of the Beijing Winter Olym- or having financial transac- they’ll also get in trouble," one Uyghur announced they strained since 2015 when
pics planned for February tions with its citizens and in- Rein said. were ending endorsement a Chinese-born Swedish
2022. stitutions. deals with foreign shoe and publisher disappeared from
The Communist Party often clothing brands. Thailand and surfaced in
Tencent, which operates More than 1 million mem- pressures foreign clothing, China. The Chinese ambas-
games and the popular We- bers of the Uyghur and travel and other brands over Gulnazar, an actress from sador angered the Swedish
Chat message service, an- other predominantly Mus- actions by their governments Xinjiang, said she was break- government by referring to it
nounced it was removing lim ethnic minorities have or in an effort to compel ing ties with Puma. On her in a TV interview as a “light-
Burberry-designed costumes been confined to detention them to adopt its positions social media account, Gulna- weight boxer."