Vanguard answers Darfur critics

0 Comments | Philadelphia Inquirer, The, October, 2007 | by Harold Brubaker Inquirer Staff Writer

The Vanguard Group said it urged four companies that operate in Sudan, where government-sponsored militias have killed hundreds of thousands and displaced millions from the Darfur region, to do what they could to improve conditions there.

But the nation's third-largest mutual fund company stopped short of selling its shares in energy companies such as China's PetroChina Co. Ltd. and India's Oil & Natural Gas Corp. Ltd., as activists have been exhorting it to do.

Instead, Vanguard sent letters to four companies "encouraging them to take part in constructive and positive change in Sudan in a way that improves the health and welfare of the Sudanese people," according to a statement.

A coalition of activists has pursued changes at Vanguard and other large mutual...