The University of Washington’s Board of Regents voted on Thursday to ban investments of the institution’s endowment in companies that do business in Sudan and thereby support a government responsible for what the board called “genocidal actions and human-rights violations” in the country’s Darfur region. According to an article in today’s Seattle Post-Intelligencer, the university has invested $1-million in one such company, Royal Dutch Shell, the petroleum giant. The university joined Williams College, Brown University, and Smith College among colleges that have recently taken steps to divest from Sudan-connected businesses.