The United States on Monday blacklisted 28 Chinese companies that develop facial recognition and other artificial intelligence technology, saying they were implicated in the repression of China’s Muslim minority.

The Commerce Department put the companies on a so-called Entity List for acting contrary to American foreign policy interests.

The blacklist effectively bars US firms from selling technology to the Chinese companies without government approval.

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said in a written statement Monday that the U.S. government "will not tolerate the brutal suppression of ethnic minorities within China."

The blacklisted companies include Hikvision and Dahua, both of which are global providers of video surveillance technology.

Hikvision said in a statement Monday that it respects human rights and strongly opposes the Trump administration's decision.

Prominent Chinese AI firms such as Sense Time, Megvii and iFlytek are also on the list. Sense Time and Megvii are known for the development of computer vision technology that underpins facial recognition products, while iFlytek is known for its voice recognition and translation services.

Along with the tech companies, the Commerce Department's filing targets local government agencies in China's northwestern Xinjiang region.

The filing said the listed groups have been implicated in "China's campaign of repression, mass arbitrary detention, and high-technology surveillance" against Uighurs, Kazakhs and other predominantly Muslim minority groups.