NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Since 2017, the Chinese government has placed an estimated 1.8 million predominantly Turkic and Muslim-majority peoples, including Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and Hui, in detention camps, prisons, and factories across the Uyghur Region in China.

This detention underpins systems of repression, in which business enterprises are involved, including wide-spread forced labor of people in and from the Uyghur Region who have been made to work in business enterprises across China; and mass surveillance of people in and from the Uyghur Region, through the use of technology.

Global companies have operations, investments, partnerships, and other business relationships in the Uyghur Region across many sectors. Institutional investors can potentially be connected to these egregious human rights abuses through their investments in these companies.

The goal of the webinar is for investors to:

• Increase their understanding of the scale and nature of the repression in the Uyghur Region and the complicity of companies in this abuse;
• Understand the salient risks to people associated with the business activities of their portfolio companies in or connected with the Uyghur Region;
• Provide guidance to investors on how to engage with its portfolio companies to identify, prevent and mitigate those risks, and where that is not possible, to consider divestment; and
• Collaborate with other investors, civil society stakeholders, international organizations, and policymakers – to stop, prevent, and mitigate risks associated with investments.

Expert speakers will offer critical perspectives for investors to navigate this human rights crisis: Rahima Mahmut, UK Project Director & Zumretay Arkin, Program Director & Advocacy, World Uyghur Congress Megha Rajagopalan, International Correspondent, BuzzFeed News Mariefaye Bechrakis, Program Manager and Research Associate, CSIS Shoko Sekiguchi, Snr. Responsible Investment Research Associate, Domini Impact Investment Moderator: Anita Dorett, Associate Program Director, ICCR

Time: 11:00 AM – 12:15 PM EDT