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ACSR Calls Upon Harvard to Divest

*Develop specific principles defining the types of direct support for apartheid that should be eliminated in any company Harvard invests in.

*Support initiatives in the U.S. government to end aparteid "to the extent consistent with its role as an independent university."

*Prepare and distribute an annual report to the Harvard community providing detailed information on companies in the Harvard portfolio that operate in South Africa and how each comply with the Sullivan and Tutu Principles.

*Direct the Harvard Management Company, the organization that handles day-to-day management of the University's endowment, to report each year on its acquisition of South African-related companies to the Corporation Committee for Shareholder Responsibility (CCSR) and ACSR.

Under current policy, Harvard will divest from companies operating in South Africa only if they refuse to adopt the Sullivan Principles or simliar policies, if persistent efforts to persuade them to adopt the principles have failed, and if there is no hope for improvement in work-place conditions.

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The Advisory Committee presented a draft copy of the report to the University's governing Corporation Monday at a joint meeting with the CCSR, spokesmen for both organizations said yesterday.

The ACSR is a committee of students, faculty, and alumni that advises the Corporation on ethical issues relating to management of Harvard's $2 billion endowment.

The CCSR is a subgroup of the nine-man Corporation that receives ACSR recommendations. The Corporation has final authority on all University investments.

"Anything less than total divestment denies the fundamental truth, that it is impossible to invest in South Africa without investing in Apartheid," said a statement released last night by the Southern Africa Solidarity Committee, a student divestiture group.

Claude Convisser '85, the undergraduate representative to the ACSR said he abstained on the less forceful part of the report "because I felt it would dilute my vote for divestiture."

Other Action

In other investment-policy action this week the CCSR accepted an ACSR recommendation on proxy resolutions calling for studies of the involvement of corporations with the production of military equipment.

In general, the advisory committee recommended that the Corporation approve such resolutions only if:

*The study had no presumed outcome.

*A similar study had not been done for the company before.

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