The United States on Friday imposed sanctions on a powerful Chinese company in the Xinjiang province and two officials for what it said were human rights abuses against Uighurs and other ethnic minorities.
The move, the latest blow to U.S.-China relations, came a week after U.S. President Donald Trump closed the Chinese consulate in Houston, prompting Beijing to shutter the U.S. consulate in Chengdu.
The U.S. Treasury Department said in a statement it blacklisted the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, also known as XPCC, along with Sun Jinlong, former party secretary of the XPCC, and Peng Jiarui, deputy party secretary and commander of the XPCC, over accusations they are connected to serious human rights abuse against ethnic minorities in Xinjiang.
"The Chinese Communist Party's human rights abuses in Xinjiang, China against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities rank as the stain of the century," U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement.