Disney is drawing fire for shooting parts of its live-action remake of “Mulan” in the Chinese region of Xinjiang, where a million Uyghur Muslims are being detained in internment camps.
The film’s credits thanks several government agencies in the northwestern region, including the police bureau in Turpan, a city in eastern Xinjiang, as well as the “publicity department of CPC Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomy Region Committee,” the propaganda department in the region.
The Turpan public security bureau was last October put on the U.S. commerce department’s trade blacklist over its involvement in the regime’s repression of Uyghur Muslims.
Since last year, the film has faced calls for a boycott after the lead actress Chinese-born Liu Yifei expressed support for Hong Kong police, who have been accused of violence against pro-democracy protesters in the city.
The film, released on Disney+ over the weekend, is the Hollywood telling of a historical tale, “The Ballad of Mulan,” that depicts an ancient Chinese heroine who disguises herself as a man to serve in the army in the place of her ailing father.
Disney did not respond to a request for comment.
More than one million Uyghur Muslims and other minority Muslims are being detained in camps across Xinjiang, as part of Beijing’s purported crackdown on “extremism.” Survivors of the internment camps have recounted being subject to torture, rape, and political indoctrination while detained. Xinjiang residents are also subject to an expansive system of surveillance through a network of AI-enhanced security cameras, checkpoints, and the collection of biometric data.
Activists stepped up calls for a boycott after these revelations emerged on social media over the weekend.
British Conservative lawmaker Iain Duncan Smith in the UK parliament on Tuesday condemned Disney’s work with a Xinjiang security agency as “appalling.”
“It is shameful that they turn a blind eye. It is shameful that they act as apologists for a regime now that brooks no dissent,” Smith said of Western companies collaborating with the Chinese regime.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration has escalated measures to punish the regime over its abuses in Xinjiang. Several Chinese officials and the paramilitary group in the region have been sanctioned, while dozens of Chinese entities and companies have been blacklisted from doing business with American firms.