Camel Group Xinjiang Battery Co., Ltd.

Batteries

Camel Group benefits from the labor transfer scheme facilitated by the Toksun County government, under a “Three-Year Plan for the Organized Transfer of Urban and Rural Surplus Labor Forces in Kashgar and Hotan Regions (2017-2019),” issued by regional and municipal governments. In 2017, this government-sponsored labor transfer program transported 165 people from the southern XUAR (as much as 1,300 kilometers away) to Turpan for a 10-day “closed pre-job training” (封闭式岗前培训工作), which indicates that the participants were not allowed to come and go freely from the training. At the training, they received military and ideological training, and they were required to sing patriotic songs and learn the Chinese language. Workers performed a flag raising ceremony and declared their commitment to fight religious extremism and ethnic division, and to “profoundly expose and criticize the crimes of violent and terrorist activities and resolutely fight against nationalist separatists.” Then officials handed the workers to Camel Group and others, to be bussed to their new jobs. There is no indication that Han migrant workers are subject to the same “closed training” or political/ideological oath taking to work at Camel Group.

These labor transfers may also be highly hazardous to the workers. Camel’s own EIA indicates that no residential areas should be within one kilometer of the facility, and that workers should labor with a 10-150m buffer from several components of the facility. However, Camel has worker dormitories directly on the property. These workers are thus exposed to hazardous contaminants during their shifts and their rest periods.