Harvard OK's some Darfur investments
Harvard University can own shares of Asian oil companies tied to war-ridden Sudan if it holds them in accounts, such as mutual funds, that the institution doesn't control directly, a governing panel said.
Harvard's Corporation Committee on Shareholder Responsibility also voted to prohibit direct ownership of stock in Oil & Natural Gas Corp., an Indian company involved in a joint venture with a Sudanese-government firm.
The Cambridge university, whose endowment was valued at $29.2 billion a year ago, made the disclosure in a statement yesterday.
Harvard had halted direct ownership in two Chinese oil firms because of their ties to Sudan's government. Under pressure from students, the university in February began examining indirect investments made through exchange-traded funds. A four-year conflict in the Darfur region has killed over 200,000 people and forced 2 million from their homes.
The panel "has concluded that no change in the university's divestment policy with respect to indirect investment is called for," according to the statement.
Fifty-four schools, including the University of Cali fornia and Stanford and Yale universities, have dropped holdings in companies doing business in Sudan, according to the Washington-based Sudan Divestment Task Force, a group promoting Sudan-related divestment.
Eighteen states and eight cities also have divested holdings, the group said.
The Harvard policy applies primarily to mutual funds, index funds, and exchange-traded funds where Harvard doesn't have direct control, the committee said.
Money invested by Harvard Management Co., a university affiliated firm, and by most outside managers whom the school hires, still can't be directly invested in three prohibited companies.
"It's morally inconsistent to only sell off these direct holdings when there are these indirect holdings that it can easily get rid of," said Trevor Bakker, a 19-year-old sophomore at the school who is a member of the advocacy organization Harvard Darfur Action Group. "We believe there are alternatives."
Harvard in 2005 ordered the sale of PetroChina Co. shares, saying revenue from the firm's partnership with Sudan's government helped finance violence in Darfur, and in 2006 divested from Sinopec, also called China Petroleum & Chemical Corp.
"If it was appropriate to divest the securities of those companies previously, it is no less so now," the governing panel said yesterday.
The US Congress and State Department have labeled the Sudan attacks "genocide."
Harvard owns about $15.5 million in shares of the Chinese companies in exchange-traded funds run by Barclays Global Investors, the San Francisco-based unit of Barclays PLC, and PowerShares Capital Management, a subsidiary of Invesco PLC, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
