Brussels, 24/09/2010 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission may consider banning imports onto the European market of products made in Chinese forced labour camps or “laogai”, the Commissioner for Enlargement, Stefan Füle, announced in Strasbourg on Thursday 23 September, during a debate at the European Parliament, where he was speaking on behalf of the Commission. With the US already having created a list of dubious Chinese companies whose products are banned from the American market, the European Union has so far chosen instead to tackle the problem “positively” as part of its political dialogue with Beijing, without imposing any restrictive commercial measures.
However, Mr Füle told the MEPs, “We must acknowledge that there are limits to this approach, which has not so far led to any notable changes in the Chinese policy regarding laogai”. It is for this reason that “the Commission is open to revisiting the question in the most effective way to apply pressure on countries that make use of prison labour in violation of fundamental human rights principles and of conventions on the international labour organisation”. He added that the Commission was prepared to look into the effectiveness of the American legislation banning these imports, whilst noting that is was “extremely difficult” to establish with any precision which products imported from China to the EU had been made in laogai. Mr Füle also laid emphasis on the fact that if the EU were to take measures against the importation of products made in prisons, these measures should concern all countries of the world, not just China. Several MEPs expressed their impatience over this dossier. “The US already has experience in this field. The question is whether the Commission is prepared to take account of the American list of Chinese companies which are actually prisons and to start consultations with the Americans” to take advantage of their expertise, stressed the German MEP Michael Gahler (EPP). “There is a raft of measures which the EU could take, the names of the Chinese companies are known. I expect concrete proposals from the Commission”, said the Austrian member Karin Kadenbach, on behalf of the S&D group. Luxembourg's Charles Goerens (ADLE), who put the number of labour camps in China at “over a thousand”, called for the EU to “tread carefully, certainly”, but in such a way as to obtain “real concessions” from China over this “scandalous” problem. France's Marie-Christine Vergiat (GUE/NGL) said that “doing at the very least what the US is doing should be the absolute minimum”. (H.B./trans.fl)