Weighing in at over 20 trillion kroner (€1.67 trillion), Norway's sovereign wealth fund, fueled by the Scandinavian kingdom's oil and gas revenues, is the largest investment fund in the world. Since the spring, a growing number of voices in Norway and abroad have called for it to divest from Israeli companies. On Monday, August 18, the fund announced it would exclude six such companies from its portfolio "with connections to the West Bank and Gaza," following recommendations from its ethics committee.

In a letter to the Ministry of Finance, Nicolai Tangen, the head of the fund, and Ida Wolden Bache, the governor of the central bank, Norges Bank, specified that since June 30, the fund has sold its holdings in 23 publicly traded Israeli companies, representing a value of 4 billion kroner. As of August 14, it still held 19 billion kroner invested in 38 Israeli companies, out of more than 8,600 companies worldwide.

At a press conference on Monday, Finance Minister Jens Stoltenberg did not rule out further sales of shares in other companies, should the fund's ethics committee, which ensures a responsible investment strategy, deem it necessary. The minister denied that these divestments amounted to "politicization" of the fund, insisting that the decision was made on the basis of "established procedures."

You have 70.06% of this article left to read. The rest is for subscribers only.