Senate Panel Backs Efforts Against Sudan / Senate panel backs divestment bill on Darfur
Two stories:
(See also a related GI-Net press release.)
The Senate Banking Committee unanimously approved legislation [on] Wednesday endorsing some state and local governments' efforts to use their investments to pressure Sudan to ease suffering in its Darfur region.
The bill quickly moved forward on a 21-0 vote, after Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., withdrew a proposed amendment that would have empowered President Bush to override decisions by the local governments.
"I don't think [that] we want to give local governments authority in foreign-policy decisions," Hagel said. But he said [that] he was stepping aside [in order] to back the bipartisan measure already approved in July by the House.
Sen. Christopher J. Dodd, D-Conn., chairman of the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, said [that] the aim was to ease "grinding misery" in Darfur.
Since 2005, 20 states and more than 50 universities have protested the violence by adopting policies of divesting funds from companies that invest in Sudan. Typically, this includes legislation to block state pension funds from investing in foreign companies that provide revenue for the government of Sudan. But the tactic has sparked legal battles, with opponents arguing [that] the states are trying to conduct their own foreign affairs, in violation of the Constitution.
The legislation would authorize such divestment as within investors' rights, so long as the states follow certain standards and notify the Treasury Department of their actions.
More than 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million [have been] driven from their homes in four years of violence in the Darfur region, since ethnic African rebels took up arms against militia supported by the Arab-dominated central government.
Bush has called the violence ["]genocide["], but the State Department at a committee hearing two weeks ago asked Congress to defer action [on the bill], saying [that] it would send the wrong message to the Sudanese government, "at a time when it is actually being helpful with peace talks."
The bill also would prohibit the U.S. government from awarding contracts to companies directly investing or conducting business operations in Sudan in four sectors: [the] oil industry, power production, mineral extraction, and military equipment.
The House passed a similar bill July 31 by a 418-1 vote.
From Reuters (also here)...
A U.S. Senate panel approved a bill on Wednesday that would protect investors from shareholder lawsuits if they pull money out of Sudan as a way of pressuring the regime to end violence in Darfur.
"I look forward to getting this bill enacted as soon as possible, and to a day when the people of Darfur can again live free of the grinding, relentless violence and misery under which they have suffered for so long," said Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd, a Connecticut Democrat.
The military conflict in Darfur in western Sudan has claimed an estimated 200,000 lives since 2003.
Dodd's panel approved the Sudan divestment bill by a 21-0 vote, sending it next to the Senate floor for action.
The Save Darfur Coalition praised the banking committee's vote and the Senate bill.
"This tough measure gives states and local governments increased ability to divest their finances from companies linked to genocide," said Allyn Brooks-LaSure, spokesman for the group.
The group said [that] the Sudanese government uses up to 70 percent of its oil revenue, generated mainly through foreign direct investment, to give arms and supplies to the Janjaweed militia accused of the killings in Darfur.
The Senate bill would bar the federal government from contracting with companies linked to the killing, and [would] require would-be federal contractors to certify that they are not involved in key sectors of the Sudanese economy. The bill would also encourage other countries to take similar steps.
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