Treasury Department Secretary Janet Yellen testified on Thursday that her department has not appeased China regarding sanctions related to its Xinjiang province genocide of minority groups.
Yellen, who unknowingly ate “hallucinogenic” mushrooms at a restaurant during a July diplomatic trip to China, testified to the Senate at a hearing on President Joe Biden’s proposed budget request for fiscal year 2025.
Republican Tennessee Sen. Marsha Blackburn accused the department of not enforcing or issuing sanctions against the Xinjiang Construction and Production Corps. She pressed Yellen on “what specific actions” the department is “taking to ensure that the Chinese Communist Party entity is sanctioned to the fullest extent of the law.”
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“Well, I absolutely agree with you that Treasury and the Biden administration should be sanctioning human rights violations that are occurring in Xinjiang, and there is no appeasement,” Yellen answered. “I want to assure you on this matter.”
Xinjiang Construction and Production Corps oversees sizable sections of the province’s agriculture and industry, according to Axios. The group is under sanctions from the U.S. government.
Former President Donald Trump’s Treasury Department sanctioned the company in 2020, asserting it is “is a paramilitary organization … that is subordinate to the Chinese Communist Party,” according to a press release. Its “structure reflects a military organization, with 14 divisions made up of dozens of regiments.”
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“There hasn’t been, to the best of my knowledge, any weakening of these sanctions. We take them seriously,” Yellen continued.
China has committed genocide against the Uyghurs and other minority groups in Xinjiang, according to the U.S. State Department.
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