CORRECTION APPENDED

Barring a change in Harvard policy, the University’s endowment holdings in Tatneft—a Russian oil company with alleged ties to the Sudanese government—will disappear from the public eye when the company delists its shares on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in the coming weeks.

In addition to delisting its shares, Tatneft plans to terminate its registration with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which it said has become too expensive to maintain. The company said that it would focus its efforts on the London Stock Exchange.

Mohamed A. El-Erian, Harvard’s chief endowment manager, told The Crimson that the move would have no effect on Harvard’s holdings in the company, implying that Harvard’s nearly $5 million stake in Tatneft would move to London.

The effect would be that the University would no longer have to disclose its holdings in Tatneft to SEC. Without the SEC filings, there would be no way to track Harvard’s holdings in the oil company, which is Russia’s fifth largest.

Tatneft has been criticized for its links to the Sudanese government in Khartoum, which has been widely condemned for its condonation of the notorious Janjaweed militias responsible for perpetrating genocide in Darfur.

Activists at several academic institutions—including Stanford University and Amherst College—have convinced their schools to divest from Tatneft along with other companies linked to the Sudan.

While Harvard has divested from Petrochina and Sinopec—two Chinese companies that do business in Sudan—it has thus far resisted calls to divest from Tatneft.

According to a 2002 article by renowned Sudan researcher Eric Reeves, a professor at Smith College, negotiations took place in 2001 between Tatneft and Sudanese officials about selling Tupolev 214 airliners and Mi-17 military transport helicopters to Sudan in exchange for access to Sudanese oil fields.

The article also said that there were “credible reports” that an “oil deal [was] consummated between Khartoum and Russia.”

But in an interview yesterday, Reeves said that he has been unable to “find the direct connection [between Tatneft and Sudan] that others are finding.” He added that “a number of divestments have included Tatneft, so my assumption is that there is something I’m not seeing.”

Other research groups—including KLD Research & Analytics, Inc., in Boston—have done more research on the direct tie between the oil company and the Sudanese government, he said.

According to a report prepared by the University of California's divestment taskforce that drew on KLD research, there have been “past allegations of aiding arms transfers to Sudan, [and the company] has not denied reports of involvement in Sudan after divestment by other universities.”

But the report noted that the nature of the company’s activities in Sudan is “unclear.”

Interim University President Derek C. Bok declined requests for comment yesterday, but Harvard spokesman Jonathan D. Longbrake released a statement saying: “We do not comment on individual investments other than what we report to the SEC.” He added that this is a “long standing policy.”

During the course of the successful divestment campaigns for PetroChina and Sinopec, however, Harvard officials made numerous comments on individual holdings that were not included in SEC filings.

Former University President Lawrence H. Summers said in March 2005 that Harvard’s stake in PetroChina had included holdings on Chinese stock markets that were not reported to the SEC.

And after the divestment in April, the University again spoke about its holdings, saying that the divestiture “reflect[ed] deep concerns about the grievous crisis that persists in the Darfur region of Sudan.”

—Cyrus M. Mossavar-Rahmani contributed to the reporting of this story.
—Staff writer Paras D. Bhayani can be reached at pbhayani@fas.harvard.edu.

CORRECTION

The July 14 article entitled "Univ. Holdings Become More Opaque" misspelled the name of Harvard spokesman John D. Longbrake. His first name is not Jonathan.