Take Action: Canada Pension Plan investments complicit with Israeli war crimes

Despite a promise in 2021 to review its portfolio for companies complicit with war crimes, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) has failed to do so.

CPPIB continues to be invested in seven companies that are on the UN database as complicit with breaking international law, and an additional at least 44 other companies that have been verified as complicit with illegal Israeli occupation. In total, this amounts to more than $10 B investment of public pension funds in Israeli war crimes.

Based on four years of analysis, there has been no significant shift in this investment trend.  

WSP, a Montreal-headquartered transnational engineering firm continues to dominate the Canadian equity holdings; in 2022, 105 organizations & many individuals joined to make a submission to the UN to add WSP to its database of corporations directly complicit in Israeli violations of international law, for its role in planning the infamous Jerusalem Light Rail, linking the illegal settlements in the West Bank with occupied Jerusalem.

During the 2022 cross country in person and virtual CPPIB stakeholder meetings, CPPIB executives were reminded of their commitment in 2021 to undertake a review of the CPPIB portfolio for investments complicit with war crimes—it seemed they had forgotten their commitment, but they said they would look into it. We are still waiting!

Of course, the CPPIB's unethical investments are not limited to companies complicit with war crimes, but are also found in fossil fuels, the military complex, privatization of natural resources in the Global South, mining and so on.

Learn more by listening to the June 2022 webinar: What Is the CPPIB Really Up To

See the full analysis from 2023 CPPIB annual report HERE.

The accountability is ultimately to the CPP's stewards – the federal Finance Minister and the Finance Ministers of the participating provinces. It is time for these officials to make clear that investments in war crimes are a bad investment for Canadian pensions.

December 2023: with over 20,000 people killed including over 10,000 children by Israel over 75 days, close to 2 million people displaced, thousands still under rubble, 50,000 injured, and infrastructure destroyed including hospitals, schools, places of worship, homes and utilities, CPPIB is complicit through its investment in war crimes and genocide.