DALLAS (AP) — A group of prominent black activists – including the Reverends Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton – have announced a boycott of B-P.

They say the British oil company gouges prices and racially discriminates in its business practices.

Jackson says B-P's targeted because none of its upper-level executives are black and there are no black owners among its hundreds of U.S. distributors.

B-P spokesman Scott Dean defended the company's diversity, saying 15 percent of B-P's U.S. employees are black and account for almost ten percent of its senior officials.

The black clergy group meeting in Dallas also says its hopes to unite ten-thousand black churches to work on a social justice agenda.

Jackson says church leaders have paid a lot of attention to gay marriage. But he notes they haven't put a similar focus "on raising the minimum wage for working poor people and adequately funding America's education system."

An official of the National Association of Evangelicals says stereotypes shouldn't be used to cause division.

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