China Agrees to Investigate Reports of Exports Made by Prison Labor

China signed an agreement with the United States on Friday promising to investigate any allegations that goods produced by prison labor are being shipped to American markets.

Prison labor products may not be imported under U.S. law. China was accused last month by a Hoover Institution researcher with holding more than 10 million Chinese in forced labor camps that produce goods for domestic and foreign markets.

The researcher, Harry Wu, is a Chinese-American who spent 19 years in Chinese labor camps. He claimed at least 1 million of the prisoners are being held for political reasons.

The agreement was signed by Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Liu Huaqui and Arnold Kanter, the U.S. undersecretary of state for political affairs.

Congress had demanded on-site prison inspections as a condition for continuing to permit Chinese products to enter the United States without high tariffs.

Alleged exports to the United States of goods made by Chinese prisoners and detainees have long been an irritant in relations between the two countries.

Legislation pending in Congress would make a ban on such exports one of a number of conditions for renewal of China’s most-favored-nation trade status next year.

Under a bill passed by the House and pending in the Senate, duties would be increased on goods made by Chinese state industries if conditions on prison goods, trade practices, human rights and missile and nuclear sales are not met.

President Bush, who favors close ties with China, is expected to veto the bill when it reaches the White House, and the Senate is unlikely to be able to muster the votes necessary to override.

Kanter, in a statement, said a U.S. Customs Service officer had been assigned to the U.S. Embassy in Beijing to implement Friday’s agreement. Eighteen products from Chinese companies have been kept out of the United States “due to credible allegations that the products were produced using prison labor,” the State Department said in a fact sheet.

Jeffrey Fiedler, secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO’s food and allied service trades department, called the agreement “fundamentally flawed” because the Chinese still have not acknowledged the existence of forced labor.