Ajcongress Accuses Dupont Co. of Surrender to Arab Boycott Demands

The American Jewish Congress accused the DuPont Co. today of “surrender” to Arab boycott demands and rejection of the same anti-boycott principles that its chairman, Irving S. Shapiro, had supported in his capacity as chairman of the Business Roundtable.

The charge was made at DuPont’s annual meeting here by Will Maslow, general counsel of the AJ Congress. He referred to a resolution submitted by four DuPont stockholders who are AJ Congress members questioning the firm’s compliance with Arab boycott demands. The DuPont Board of Directors urged its stockholders to reject the resolution in a letter circulated along with the notice of the annual meeting.

Maslow noted that the Business Roundtable, consisting of some 150 top American business executives throughout the country, wrote to President Carter on March 3 enclosing a “Joint Statement of Principles re Foreign Boycott Legislation” signed by Shapiro and Burton M. Joseph, national chairman of the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith.

SAYS PROHIBITIONS IGNORED IN PRACTICE

The statement included “a series of recommendations for anti-boycott legislation, including a prohibition of negative blacklisting and similar exclusionary certificates” which the DuPont chairman urged the Senate and House to enact into law, Maslow said.

“Yet these very prohibitions…are ignored by DuPont in its business practices and rejected by DuPont’s management.” Maslow asserted. He cited as evidence of DuPont’s “surrender” to the Arab boycott a letter the company sent to the Securities and Exchange Commission Jan, 21, 1977 admitting that it furnished Arab customers with certificates attesting to the non-Israeli origin of goods and “statements concerning the non-existence of certain commercial relations with Israel at the time of certification.”

Maslow also quoted a letter of Jan, 16, 1976 that he received from DuPont acknowledging that “certain purchasers of DuPont products who are located in Arab countries have stipulated as conditions of purchase that the goods not contain Israeli raw materials and that the goods not be shipped in Israeli vessels or other blacklisted vessels…” Maslow said the letter also admitted that DuPont had indicated to purchasers that it did not have a branch in Israel and that particular goods sold to an Arab purchaser did not contain Israeli raw materials.

SPECIFIC PROPOSALS SUBMITTED

The proposals submitted by the AJ Congress stockholders wanted to know what steps the company will take to prevent discrimination against any Jewish executive, employee, applicant for employment or supplier as part of its efforts to obtain business from Arab interests; whether the company would reject a request or instruction from an Arab customer to refuse to do business with an American firm now on the Arab blacklist; whether the company has agreed or will agree not to establish a plant in Israel or enter into licensing agreements with Israeli companies; and what steps the company has taken to assure that its officers, agents and employees will not tacitly refuse to do business with blacklisted firms or with Israel.

In urging rejection of these demands, the DuPont board charged that they were “an attempt to politicize our annual meeting” and are “not in the interests of our stockholders.”