In Washington, State Department spokesperson condemned China's state-led social media campaign and corporate and consumer boycott against companies. "If they don't try to criticize, they'll also get in trouble," Rein said.
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He said companies are especially sensitive because this comes at a time when Chinese anti-monopoly and other regulators are stepping up scrutiny of internet operators. Rein said the outpouring of anger at H&M is the harshest he has seen against a foreign brand.
That prompted Chinese retailers and internet companies to distance themselves from the Swedish retailer, though other brands still were available on e-commerce platforms."It's a form of self-preservation," said Shaun Rein, managing director of China Market Research Group in Shanghai. State media accused H&M and other brands of improperly profiting from China while criticizing it. The Chinese government rejects complaints of abuses and says the camps are for job training to support economic development and combat Islamic radicalism. Authorities there are accused of imposing forced labour and coercive birth control measures. More than 1 million members of the Uyghur and other predominantly Muslim ethnic minorities have been confined to detention camps in Xinjiang, according to foreign governments and researchers. They are banned from visiting China or having financial transactions with its citizens and institutions. On Friday, the Chinese government announced penalties against nine Britons and four institutions. The ruling Communist Party's Youth League launched attacks Wednesday on H&M following the European Union's decision to join the United States, Britain and Canada in imposing sanctions on Chinese officials blamed for abuses in Xinjiang. Regulators have broad powers to punish companies that fail to support official policy. It wasn't clear whether companies received orders to erase H&M's online presence, but Chinese enterprises are expected to fall in line without being told. Its smartphone app disappeared from app stores. In a high-tech version of the airbrushing used by China and other authoritarian regimes to delete political enemies from historic photos, H&M's approximately 500 stores in China didn't show up on ride-hailing app Didi Chuxing or map services operated by Alibaba and Baidu. Tencent, which operates games and the popular WeChat message service, announced it was removing Burberry-designed costumes from a popular mobile phone game. That pressure is rising as human rights activists are lobbying sponsors to pull out of the Beijing Winter Olympics planned for February 2022.
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Shockwaves spread to other brands as dozens of celebrities called off endorsement deals with Nike, Adidas, Burberry, Uniqlo and Lacoste after state media criticized the brands for expressing concern about Xinjiang.īrands are struggling to respond to pressure abroad to distance themselves from abuses without triggering Chinese retaliation and losing access to one of the biggest and fastest-growing markets. That hurts H&M's ability to reach customers in a country where more than a fifth of shopping is online. H&M products were missing from major e-commerce platforms including Alibaba and JD.com following calls by state media for a boycott over the Swedish retailer's decision to stop buying cotton from Xinjiang. H&M disappeared from the internet in China as the government raised pressure on shoe and clothing brands and announced sanctions Friday against British officials in a spiraling fight over complaints of abuses in the Xinjiang region.