151. Memorandum From the Deputy Secretary of State (Christopher) to the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs (Brzezinski)1

SUBJECT

  • OPIC and Human Rights

Pursuant to our telephone conversation this morning, I am attaching a copy of the arrangements we worked out with OPIC in early June for bringing human rights considerations to bear on OPIC programs. These procedures were designed to be responsive to the spirit and letter of the new human rights provisions in the OPIC legislation (copy also attached),2 while at the same time preserving flexibility and permitting us to avoid publicly identifying other countries as gross and consistent human rights violators.

You will be particularly interested in the last three sentences of the procedures.

Since agreeing upon these arrangements, we have reviewed a number of OPIC programs. We have recommended approval of a total of 18 programs involving 13 countries, and have thus far not recommended disapproval of any programs.

Attachment

Memorandum Prepared in the Department of State3

Informal Procedures For Bringing Human Rights Considerations To Bear on OPIC Programs

(Not for Distribution)

1. OPIC support of a private investment in a country will be withheld when the Interagency Group on Human Rights and Foreign As [Page 495] sistance (chaired by the Deputy Secretary of State) recommends, and the OPIC Board of Directors agrees, that OPIC should not provide the proposed support because the host government is engaged in extensive and extremely serious violations of human rights. OPIC will include in its Annual Report to Congress appropriate information on projects for which OPIC assistance is refused on account of human rights considerations or provided despite such considerations, with appropriate general explanations.

2. In order to give the Interagency Group an opportunity to make its recommendation, OPIC will submit to HA [the Bureau of Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs] a summary of each project which OPIC proposes to assist. If HA has reservations about a project, it will refer it to the Interagency Group. In addition to human rights conditions in the country involved, there are a variety of important relevant factors to be considered in determining what recommendation to make concerning OPIC support. They include the relationship between the project and the government of the host country. (This relationship might be gauged by such factors as host government involvement as a lender or equity holder; fiscal impact of the project; size or political symbolism of the project.)

  1. Source: National Archives, RG 59, Office of the Deputy Secretary: Records of Warren Christopher, 1977–1980, Lot 81D113, Box 9, Memoranda to the White House—1978. Confidential.
  2. Attached but not printed are the relevant portions of P.L. 95–268.
  3. Confidential. Brackets are in the original.