California State Assembly votes to divest from Turkey
02.06.2017,
19:04
With a vote of 61 to 0, the California State Assembly overwhelmingly voted to adopt Assemblyman Adrin Nazarian’s measure (AB 1597) – a movement long championed by the Armenian National Committee of America Western Region and Armenian Youth Federation Western Region – calling for the divestment of California public funds from Turkish government controlled financial instruments, ensuring taxpayer funds are no longer used in this manner to aid and abet Turkey’s century long obstruction of justice for the Armenian Genocide, asbarez.com reported.
YEREVAN, June 2. /ARKA/. With a vote of 61 to 0, the California State Assembly overwhelmingly voted to adopt Assemblyman Adrin Nazarian’s measure (AB 1597) – a movement long championed by the Armenian National Committee of America Western Region and Armenian Youth Federation Western Region – calling for the divestment of California public funds from Turkish government controlled financial instruments, ensuring taxpayer funds are no longer used in this manner to aid and abet Turkey’s century long obstruction of justice for the Armenian Genocide, asbarez.com reported.
“We are truly grateful for the leadership shown by our 2016 Legislator of the Year, Assemblymember Adrin Nazarian, in introducing and guiding this unprecedented ‘Divest Turkey’ bill to a successful vote in the California State Assembly,” said ANCA-WR Chair Nora Hovsepian, Esq.
“We are also grateful to the thousands of California Armenians who heeded our Action Alert to call upon their elected representatives to support AB1597 and to the AYF for initiating this Divest Turkey movement by successfully securing resolutions from all nine campuses of the University of California and for working with us side by side to educate our elected representatives and to mobilize our grassroots.”
AB 1597 prohibits the boards of the California Public Retirement System (CalPERS) and California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) from making additional or new investments, or renewing existing investments issued, owned, controlled, or managed by the government of Turkey. The measure notes that CalPERS and CalSTRS must liquidate any of the investments within six months of the passage of a federal law imposing sanctions on Turkey.
Currently, CalPERS and CalSTRS have invested more than $500 million in Turkish government-owned or controlled investment vehicles, predominantly in Turkish government bonds.
The Divest Turkey campaign started as a collaborative initiative in December 2014 between the Armenian Youth Federation (AYF) Western United States and Armenian students on local University of California campuses.
The campaign calls international divestment of funds from the Republic of Turkey in any and all institutions in order to hold Turkey accountable for its continuing human rights violations toward Armenians, Kurds and other minorities in Turkey today, and for the yet unpunished crime of genocide against the Armenian people, as well as the Assyrian and Greek peoples. -0-
“We are truly grateful for the leadership shown by our 2016 Legislator of the Year, Assemblymember Adrin Nazarian, in introducing and guiding this unprecedented ‘Divest Turkey’ bill to a successful vote in the California State Assembly,” said ANCA-WR Chair Nora Hovsepian, Esq.
“We are also grateful to the thousands of California Armenians who heeded our Action Alert to call upon their elected representatives to support AB1597 and to the AYF for initiating this Divest Turkey movement by successfully securing resolutions from all nine campuses of the University of California and for working with us side by side to educate our elected representatives and to mobilize our grassroots.”
AB 1597 prohibits the boards of the California Public Retirement System (CalPERS) and California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) from making additional or new investments, or renewing existing investments issued, owned, controlled, or managed by the government of Turkey. The measure notes that CalPERS and CalSTRS must liquidate any of the investments within six months of the passage of a federal law imposing sanctions on Turkey.
Currently, CalPERS and CalSTRS have invested more than $500 million in Turkish government-owned or controlled investment vehicles, predominantly in Turkish government bonds.
The Divest Turkey campaign started as a collaborative initiative in December 2014 between the Armenian Youth Federation (AYF) Western United States and Armenian students on local University of California campuses.
The campaign calls international divestment of funds from the Republic of Turkey in any and all institutions in order to hold Turkey accountable for its continuing human rights violations toward Armenians, Kurds and other minorities in Turkey today, and for the yet unpunished crime of genocide against the Armenian people, as well as the Assyrian and Greek peoples. -0-
