After Board of Governors Rally,

Carleton One Step Closer to Divestment

On March 29th, 2011 students, faculty, staff, alumni and community allies made a significant stride toward divestment at Carleton University in Ottawa, the capital of Canada. Students Against Israeli Apartheid (SAIA) first launched our campus-based pension fund divestment campaign in January 2010. The student-led campaign was motivated by the 2005 call from Palestinian civil society “to impose broad boycotts and implement divestment initiatives against Israel… until it fully complies with the precepts of international law.”

After over a year of failed attempts to meet with Carleton’s Pension Fund Committee, SAIA submitted a formal request to present our motion to the Board of Governors (BOG) – the highest decision-making body of the university – to divest from four companies complicit in violations of international law in Palestine: BAE Systems, Northrop Grumman, Motorola and Tesco Supermarkets. These companies manufacture weapons and weapons components used by the Israeli military against Palestinians, and also facilitate the expansion of illegal settlements in the West Bank (for background see: http://carleton.saia.ca/pension-divestment-campaign.html). SAIA’s motion also called upon Carleton to implement a binding socially responsible investment policy, in full consultation with the Carleton community.

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PRESS RELEASE

Carleton University Student Association first Canadian student union to call for divestment from "illegal occupation"

Motion inspired by Students Against Israeli Apartheid (SAIA) campaign

OTTAWA, February 18, 2011 - More than 300 Carleton students rallied to support a controversial Student Union motion on the University's Pension Fund Investments. With hundreds of students chanting for ethical investment, a motion was passed, based on SAIA's campaign and calling for Carleton to divest from companies that profit off of "illegal occupation".

"This is an important first step" said Reem Bushaisi, a Carleton student and member of SAIA. "Now, we will be taking a motion to the Board of Governors in March with a clear message: we don't want our money supporting military occupation."

The Carleton University Pension Fund currently has no binding ethical investment guidelines and invests in a number of major human rights violators. Last year SAIA researched the Fund and produced a 34 page report detailing five companies that are complicit in violations of human rights and international law in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. SAIA and over two dozen of students clubs have called on the university to divest from these companies and to adopt a broad socially responsible investment policy.

"I'm impressed by this motion and the students' passion in supporting it" said Trevor Purvis, Professor in Carleton's Department of Law. "It's shocking to think that my retirement savings would accumulate through violations of International Law in the Occupied Palestinian Territories or anywhere else in the world."

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SAIA Divestment Report:
http://carleton.saia.ca/documents/DivestmentCampaign/CarletonUniversityDivestmentReport.pdf

Media Contacts

Reem Buhaisi
Students Against Israeli Apartheid, Carleton University
(613) 286 - 2532

Trevor Purvis
Professor of Law, Carleton University
(819) 457 - 2031

SAIA Carleton launches pension divestment campaign > > >

". . . the global movement for boycott, divestment and sanctions, BDS, against Israel presents not only a progressive, anti-racist, sophisticated, sustainable, moral and effective form of civil, non-violent resistance, but a real chance of becoming the political catalyst and moral anchor for a strengthened, reinvigorated international social movement capable of reaffirming the rights of all humans to freedom, equality and dignity and the right of nations to self-determination." --- Omar Barghouti