The U.S. State Department’s 2025 Trafficking in Persons Report has once again placed China at the top of the global list for state-sponsored human trafficking. The report identifies China as one of 13 countries with a documented “policy or pattern” of human trafficking, showing how the Chinese Communist Party has woven coercion and forced labor into its governance and economic strategy.
Countries With Documented “Policy or Pattern” of Human Trafficking
The 2025 report lists the following governments as complicit in systemic trafficking practices:
- Afghanistan
- Belarus
- Burma
- Cambodia
- China
- Cuba
- Eritrea
- Iran
- North Korea
- Russia
- South Sudan
- Sudan
- Syria (Assad regime)
China stands out as the largest economy on the list and the one generating the most global impact through supply chains tainted with forced labor.
The Magnitude of China’s Violations
According to the report, 3.9 million people are subjected to state-imposed forced labor in China and other countries, generating an estimated $236 billion annually in illegal profits. China’s abuses are centered in the Xinjiang region, where Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and other minorities are imprisoned and forced into labor camps under the banner of “poverty alleviation” or “economic development.” These schemes allow the government to deny that detention camps exist while continuing to compel labor through coercive “community service” or “training” programs.
Select Committee on China Chairman John Moolenaar summarized the scale of the crisis: “China’s genocide of ethnic and religious minorities in Xinjiang is a human trafficking nightmare under which hundreds of thousands of innocent people are arbitrarily imprisoned and forced into labor camps. Last year, China made billions of dollars off of these heinous acts.”
Types of Human Trafficking
The 2025 report outlines multiple forms of trafficking, each of which can be linked to practices inside China:
Sex Trafficking
This involves forcing or coercing individuals into commercial sex acts. In China, there are documented cases of women and girls trafficked domestically and across borders, often under threats of harm or through debt manipulation. Vulnerable groups, including rural women and migrants, are particularly at risk.
Child Sex Trafficking
Any commercial sex act involving children is trafficking, regardless of coercion. Reports point to Chinese criminal networks using children in exploitative industries, while state controls often downplay or obscure these cases.
Forced Labor
This includes using force, fraud, or coercion to compel individuals to work. China’s largest abuse is here: minority groups in Xinjiang are forced into factories producing textiles, electronics, and agricultural products that feed global markets.
Domestic Servitude
Traffickers compel victims to perform work in private homes, often in isolation. In China, this is less visible but persists among migrant domestic workers who are vulnerable to coercion due to lack of legal protections and language barriers.
Forced Child Labor
Children are coerced into factory work, agriculture, or mining. In some cases, Uyghur children are separated from families under “boarding school” systems designed to strip away culture while exploiting their labor.
Debt Bondage
Traffickers manipulate debt to force victims into work. In China, internal migrants often fall into cycles of indebtedness tied to recruitment fees or withheld wages, binding them to exploitative employers.
State-Sponsored Human Trafficking
This is the most severe charge against China. The government itself orchestrates forced labor, mass detentions, and coerced relocations under state-run “poverty alleviation” schemes. The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act in the U.S. was passed specifically to counter this practice.
Use of Child Soldiers
While less prominent in China than in conflict states, the report includes this category to emphasize that child exploitation in military or paramilitary roles remains a global problem. In China’s case, youth indoctrination and coerced service in state programs blur into this category.
Global and Economic Impact
The widespread use of forced labor by China undermines global trade, creates unfair competition, and drags down wages worldwide. American companies importing goods from China are at risk of violating the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which prohibits goods made with forced labor from entering U.S. markets.
As the report stresses, eliminating forced labor from supply chains protects workers, safeguards consumers, and ensures that global trade does not reward abusive regimes. China’s systemic trafficking is not only a human rights catastrophe but also an economic distortion felt worldwide.