Citing labor abuses, Oslo disinvests in globalist monster
Norwegian Finance Minister Kristin Halvorsen revealed Tuesday that two new stocks will be banned from the country's so-called "oil fund," which now is called the Norwegian Government Pension Fund - Global and currently is worth about $250 billion. It ranks as one of the biggest pension funds in the world.
The ministry reported that it's excluding Wal-Mart Stores Inc and Wal-Mart de México "in line with recommendations from the Council on Ethics for the Fund."
Halvorsen's finance ministry officials cited "serious" and "systematic violations of human rights and labor rights" as its reason for pulling out of its Wal-Mart investments.
Halvorsen was quoted in a government statement as saying that the exclusions "reflect our refusal to contribute to serious, systematic or gross violations of ethical norms in these areas through our investments in the Government Pension Fund - Global."
Investing in Wal-Mart, Halvorsen claimed, "entails an unacceptable risk that the Fund may be complicit in serious... violations of norms."
US-based Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer with revenues of nearly $300 billion, has been harshly criticized for its labor practices. Norway's Council on Ethics claimed that an "extensive body of material indicates that Wal-Mart consistently and systematically employs minors in contravention of international rules, that working conditions at many of its suppliers are dangerous or health-hazardous, that workers are pressured into working overtime without compensations, that the company systematically discriminates against women in pay," and that attempts to organize workers into unions are stopped.
The council's assessments involve Wal-Mart's business operations in the US and Canada and at its suppliers in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras, Lesotho, Kenya, Uganda, Namibia, Malawi, Madagascar, Swaziland, Bangladesh, China and Indonesia.
The council and Norway's central bank wrote to Wal-Mart last fall, asking them to comment on the allegations. The Norwegian Finance Ministry said Wal-Mart never responded.
Source: Aftenposten
Posted by proutist-universal on June 29, 2006 3:57 AM | TrackBack
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"In economic life there is extreme inequality and exploitation. Although colonialism no longer exists openly in the political and economic sphere, still it persists indirectly, and this should not be tolerated... In this respect you should remember that in economic life, we will have to guarantee the minimum requirements of life to one and all... There cannot be any sort of adjustment as far as this point is concerned. The minimum purchasing requirement must be guaranteed to all. Today these fundamental essentialities are not being guaranteed. Rather, people are being guided by deceptive economic ideas like outdated Marxism, which has proven ineffective in practical life and has not been successfully implemented in any corner of the world. Why do people still believe in such a theory, which has never been proved successful? The time has come for people to make a proper assessment of whether they are being misguided or not." |
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"Human beings have still not been able to form a human society, and have still not learned to move with the spirit of a pilgrim. Although many small groups, motivated by self-interest, work together in particular situations, not even a small fraction of their work is done with a broader social motive. By strict definition, shall we have to declare that each small family unit is a society in itself? If going ahead in mutual adjustment only out of narrow self-interest or momentary self-seeking is called society, then in such a society, no provision can be made for the disabled, the diseased or the helpless, because in most cases nobody can benefit from them in any way... in that case there always remains the possibility of some people getting isolated from the collective. All human beings must attach themselves to others by the common bond of love and march forward hand in hand; then only will I proclaim it a society." |