A multi-signature open letter formally complaining that PetroChina is supporting genocide by the Sudan government in Darfur has been delivered to the United Nations Global Compact.
The letter accuses PetroChina, Sudan’s largest oil industry partner and a Compact participant, of backing the regime as the publicly traded arm of the China National Petroleum Corporation. It says PetroChina has financial links with Khartoum, thus perpetuating the six-year humanitarian crisis in Darfur, which many consider to be genocide.
The signatories consist of government officials, the US actress Mia Farrow and more than 80 civil society organizations, including human rights, corporate accountability and religious groups from 25 countries.
The Compact’s founding principles urge businesses to support and respect human rights, and its integrity measures define steps to safeguard the reputation, integrity and good efforts of the Compact and its participants.
The complaint was submitted under the integrity measures and asks the Compact to use its ‘good offices’ to influence PetroChina to engage with the Sudan government on the Darfuri people’s behalf.
If the issues are not satisfactorily resolved after three months, the group will ask the Compact to ‘consider PetroChina’s participation to be detrimental to the reputation and integrity of the Global Compact and remove the company from the list of participants’.
Eric Cohen, chairperson of Investors against Genocide, said: ‘The Compact must take a strong stand against the abuse of its founding principles. PetroChina is in violation of the principles for its failure to respect human rights, its lack of due diligence in avoiding human rights violations, its continuing refusal to correct the abuses and the widespread recognition that it is a major contributor to the conflict in Darfur.’
PetroChina has claimed independence from China National Petroleum Corporation, but the two companies appear inseparable. KLD Research & Analytics, an independent consultancy, concluded in May 2007 that investors should treat the two as if they were a single entity. Comprehensive research by the Genocide Intervention Network reaches the same conclusion, and the Multinational Monitor named the corporation as one of the worst companies of 2008 for its role in ‘fuelling violence in Darfur’.