Press release on BerkshireDARFUR ADVOCATES URGE BERKSHIRE
HATHAWAY TO LIVE UP TO “MOST ADMIRED” STATUS
Letter to Warren Buffett sets
record straight - $3 billion stake in PetroChina is helping to fund the
genocide in Sudan
BOSTON, MA, March 9, 2007 – The Fidelity Out of Sudan campaign, a Boston-based group of citizens urging American investment firms to divest from Sudan, sent a letter today to Warren Buffett, Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, an Omaha, Nebraska-based insurance and investment company whose nearly $3 billion stake in PetroChina Company Limited (PetroChina) makes it the company’s largest US investor. The letter follows Tuesday’s announcement by FORTUNE that Berkshire Hathaway is the fourth “most admired” company in the US. It also follows yesterday’s news that shareholders will have an opportunity to vote at the company’s annual meeting in May on whether Berkshire Hathaway should sell its stake in PetroChina.
PetroChina’s government-owned parent company, China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), is a major enabler of the genocide in Darfur,” wrote Eric Cohen, Chairperson of the Fidelity Out of Sudan campaign, “because 70-80 percent of the income generated from Sudan’s lucrative revenue sharing agreement with CNPC is funneled into its military.”
The letter further states “PetroChina is linked to CNPC through a collaborative and reciprocal relationship including “ongoing transfers of assets between parent and subsidiary” and “significant management overlap.”
The letter was sent in response to a series of assertions made by Berkshire Hathaway in a statement that was first posted to its website on February 21, 2007. In the statement, Berkshire Hathaway claims that divestment advocates are “wrong” about the relevance of the company’s large PetroChina holdings to the genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan.
“A closer and more thoughtful review of the facts shows that it is Berkshire Hathaway that has reached the wrong conclusion regarding its role in this tragic humanitarian crisis,” wrote Cohen. The letter specifically repudiates three aspects of the Berkshire statement and asks that the company either divest or strenuously and publicly engage PetroChina to change the government of Sudan’s behavior.
Berkshire Hathaway and Fidelity Investments each have very large investments in PetroChina. “One of America’s most admired companies should not be supporting the genocide in Darfur thorough its investment strategy,” states Cohen. “ Both Berkshire and Fidelity would like to distance themselves from any involvement in this first genocide of the 21st century. However, their large holdings in PetroChina make them especially well positioned to play an important role in helping to end it.”
A growing number of institutions and individuals, ranging from Harvard and Yale University to the state of California and its Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, have also determined that the ties between PetroChina and CNPC are so intimate that divestment is warranted.
The full text of the letter to Warren Buffett is below. [Available Here]
Since it began in February 2003, the genocide sponsored by the Sudanese government and perpetrated by its Janjaweed militias has claimed an estimated 400,000 lives, displaced 2.5 million people and left more than 3.5 million men, women and children struggling to survive amid violence and starvation.
A more detailed analysis on Berkshire Hathaway’s statement and further information on the
complex relationship between PetroChina and CNPC are available from the Sudan Divestment Task Force at www.sudandivestment.org.
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About Eric Cohen – Eric Cohen is Chair of the Fidelity Out of Sudan campaign and Co-Chair of the Massachusetts Coalition to Save Darfur.
About Fidelity Out Of Sudan – The Fidelity Out Of Sudan campaign was launched in January 2007 to pressure Fidelity Investments and other American investment firms to divest from certain oil companies that are operating in Sudan and thereby helping to fund genocide in Darfur. In addition to asking individuals to call or write Fidelity to object to its holdings in PetroChina and Sinopec, the campaign urges all investors to review their personal portfolios with their investment advisors and divest from any Sudanese oil-related investments. To sign a petition asking Fidelity to divest and for more detailed information, please visit www.FidelityOutOfSudan.com.