Volkswagen is building cars in Xinjiang, People’s Republic of China.  You know Xinjiang, the “semi-autonomous” region of the PRC that’s home to tens millions of Muslims and to President Xi Jinping’s “reeducation” camps, Mao-ist internment camps for millions of those Muslims, a people of whom Xi disapproves.

VW thinks all of that is jake.

Speaking with DW on Tuesday, the company said its 2012 decision to open the Urumqi facility was “based purely on economics.” VW says it expects “further economic growth in the region over the coming years.”

Sure. Because economics isn’t just important (such considerations are), it’s all that matters (because principles, apparently, are for academics and parlor small talk).  And: economic growth in the region for whom?  The camp inmates?  Volkswagen?

Never mind the likelihood that Volkswagen’s facility uses forced labor.

We do not assume any of our employees are forced laborers.

Well, alrighty, then. A forced labor force is assumed away, so it doesn’t exist.  It’s all good.