Norwegian fund bars US, German arms makers over Gaza war

OSLO, Norway: Norway’s biggest pension fund KLP said Monday it had dropped US group Oshkosh Corporation and Germany’s ThyssenKrupp from its investment portfolio for selling weapons and equipment used by Israel’s military in Gaza.

KLP — which is separate from Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, the world’s largest — said Oshkosh Corporation was supplying trucks to the Israeli military, which adapts them into armoured troop transport vehicles.

The fund also accused ThyssenKrupp of agreeing to supply Israel’s navy, before the outbreak of the war in Gaza, with corvettes and submarines.

“Companies have an independent duty to exercise due diligence in order to avoid complicity in violations of fundamental human rights and humanitarian law,” Kiran Aziz, head of responsible investments at KLP Asset Management, said in a statement.

KLP, which managed assets worth $114 billion in the first quarter, sold its holdings in Oshkosh Corporation valued at 19 million kroner ($1.9 million).

It also sold its investment in ThyssenKrupp worth 10 million kroner.

The two companies were excluded on the basis of KLP’s criterion relating to the “sale of weapons to states in armed conflicts that use the weapons in ways that represent serious and systematic breaches of international law governing the conflicts”, KLP said.

The fund emphasised that the two companies had long-established cooperations with the Israeli army, and their deliveries continued after the start of the Gaza war on October 7, 2023.

“The transfer of weapons and ammunition to Israel may constitute serious violations of human rights and international humanitarian laws and risk state complicity in international crimes, possibly including genocide,” UN experts warned in June 2024.

Meanwhile, Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, whose assets are valued at around $1.9 trillion, is also under pressure to divest further from groups accused of helping Israel wage war on Gaza and continue its settlement policy in the occupied West Bank.