US lawmakers have pushed for a ban on imports from a vast area of northwestern China because of the widespread use of forced labour in a region where the communist government has detained more than a million people in a campaign against ethnic minorities.

The US already bans imports made with forced labour, but a bipartisan group of lawmakers said virtually anything coming from Xinjiang, including goods sold by major American and global consumer brands, should be considered tainted by the mass detention and repression of Uighurs and other ethnic minorities. "We know forced ...