Clothes retailer H&M has returned to the Chinese e-commerce platform TMall over a year after being removed in retaliation for denouncing the country’s human rights abuses in Xinjiang.
The fashion giant was restored to the Alibaba platform 16 months after being removed in March 2021, according to Reuters. It is unclear what prompted the online shopping platform to reopen H&M on its site.
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H&M was removed from the Chinese shopping platform after the clothing retailer vowed not to purchase cotton from the Xinjiang region in protest of human rights abuses in the region. Human rights groups and the United Nations have issued reports estimating that over a million people, mainly Uyghurs and other Muslim groups, have been held in detainment camps over the last several years. China has denied allegations of abuse.
H&M, the second-largest clothing retailer in the world, was hit especially hard by China’s retaliation. Although other brands such as Nike and Adidas had celebrity ambassadors sever ties with the companies over their commitments not to use cotton from Xiajing, H&M was the only one to get its brand wiped completely from the country’s online networks.
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Since being barred from the TMall platform, H&M has only been able to sell products to Chinese consumers through its own website or on WeChat, a Chinese messaging app.
China is the top producer of cotton fabric exported worldwide, with most of that material coming from Xinjiang.
