Ministers handed almost £150m to Chinese firms with links to alleged human rights abuses in Xinjiang amid a race for PPE after Covid hit.
The Health Department paid £122m to Winner Medical, which uses cotton produced by a supplier that works in the controversial region and has ties to a paramilitary group accused by the US of using forced labour.
Another £19m contract went to pharmaceutical firm China Meheco and £16.5m was paid to Sinopharm, both of which have been linked to labour programmes in the province.
Campaigners have accused the Communist regime in China of a brutal crackdown on Uighur Muslims living in Xinjiang, with thousands imprisoned and allegedly forced into slave labour.
The original full article can be found at telegraph.co.uk
