"Today, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned one Chinese government entity and four current or former government officials in connection with serious rights abuses against ethnic minorities in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR)," the release said.
The designated persons include XUAR Communist Party Secretary Chen Quanguo, XPSB former Communist Party Secretary Huo Liujun, XPSB Director and Communist Party Secretary Wang Mingshan and former XUAR Deputy Communist Party Secretary Zhu Hailun.
Last month, US President Donald Trump signed into law the Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act that allows the government to impose sanctions against China over alleged human rights violations of the Muslim minority.
The United States and other primarily Western nations have criticized China for reportedly holding up to one million ethnic Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims in re-education camps in the Xinjiang region under the pretext of fighting terrorism and religious extremism as of last summer.
China has rejected all accusations, saying the claims are not true.