City may boycott businesses with Sudan ties

By Seth Rosen

Published: May 14, 2008

Charlottesville city councilors are poised to pass a resolution prohibiting Charlottesville from investing in companies that do business with the Sudanese government.

The city is set to follow the lead of 24 states and 19 other cities that have established divestment policies to ensure they do not own assets in companies that prop up Sudan’s oil, power, mineral and military sectors. Money from investment in those areas has been channeled to pay for military equipment used to perpetuate genocide in Darfur, the U.S. government claims.

While it is unclear if councilors will adopt the resolution at their Monday meeting, a majority said in interviews that they back the measure.

“We should not be supporting dictators who are committing genocide against people,” Councilor Satyendra Huja said. “This is a practical way to show our support for human rights.”

A preliminary investigation of Charlottesville’s $81 million in investments revealed that the city does not hold any stock and does not have mutual fund exposure to any company that collaborates with the Sudanese regime of Omar Hassan al-Bashir, said Jennifer Brown, the city’s treasurer.

Once a resolution is passed, Brown will sit down with the city’s eight fund managers to ensure that they sell any assets in such companies, which would include PetroChina.

The Sudanese government and local Arab militias, known as janjaweed, have pursued a violent campaign since 2003 against the non-Arab residents of Darfur, a dust-swept, western region of the country. At least 200,000 have been killed, thousands raped and more than 2.5 million displaced from their homes.

The Bush administration in 2004 labeled the systematic bloodshed as “genocide,” and in December 2007, Congress passed a law encouraging state and local governments to adopt Sudan divestment measures to ramp up economic pressure on the regime. A divestment bill passed the Virginia Senate this year but died in a House subcommittee.

The Sudanese government funnels money from foreign investment directly into its military campaign against the people of Darfur, activists say. A report by the Genocide Intervention Network’s Divestment Task Force found that 70 percent of the government’s share of oil profits is spent on the military.

Mohamed Yahya, who was raised in Darfur and moved to Charlottesville as a refugee in 2002, said that investment in such companies amounts to “blood money.”

“Those tanks, munitions, aircraft and helicopters used by the government to kill the innocent people of Darfur comes from the money they get from foreign companies,” Yahya said.

Members of the University of Virginia branch of Students Taking Action Now: Darfur have implored councilors to pass the resolution, arguing that such a move would send a strong message about the community’s priorities and would help raise awareness of the Darfur genocide.

“This has a real economic impact and is a statement of solidarity, both of which are important,” said Laura Harris, the organization’s president.

The university banned direct investment in companies operating in Sudan in 2006, at a time when the school held no such assets.

There is precedent for the City Council to support such a step: In the 1980s the council established a divestment policy toward the apartheid regime of South Africa.

Mayor Dave Norris said he would like councilors to take a look at the city’s overall investment strategy to ensure it is socially responsible, so that they do not have to pass piecemeal resolutions.

Reached by phone, Norris, Huja and David Brown all said they support the idea.