Middle East Eye reports:

The college council of the University of Cambridge’s wealthiest constituent college, Trinity College Cambridge, has voted to divest from all arms companies, Middle East Eye can reveal.

MEE learnt from three well-informed sources close to Trinity’s student union that the college council, responsible for major financial and other decisions, voted to remove Trinity’s investments from arms companies in early March.

According to the sources, the college decided not to announce that it would divest from arms companies after an activist defaced a 1914 portrait of Lord Arthur Balfour – who authored the infamous Balfour Declaration – inside the college on 8 March.

The incident prompted widespread media coverage in the UK – and condemnation from British MPs, including Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden.

According to the official minutes of Trinity College Student Union’s meeting on Saturday 11 May, the student union committee’s president said that the body had met with students and the college about Trinity’s investments in Israeli arms companies.

“The latest update is that Trinity will be and is in the process of divesting; however, the college will not be making a public statement on the matter,” the president was recorded as saying:

“This is because the college does not want to be seen to reward the slashing (last term) of the painting of Arthur Balfour”, and noted that the student union had been told the college will have divested from all arms companies “by the summer”.

Another member of the student union committee added: “We have been told the college council voted to divest.” [Continue reading…]