The almost unanimous vote by more than 300 students follows a series of recent protests against the university’s shares in the arms trade.

At several occasions during the past few months students lay on the ground on campus wearing T-shirts covered in red spots while the others posed with toy guns, distributed flyers and held up a banner painted with The University of Manchester logo and the phrase ‘Established to fund the arms trade.’

The vote obliges the Student Union to support a campaign demanding university divestment from the arms trade.

The University of Manchester holds shares in four arms companies: BAE Systems, Rolls Royce, GKN and Smiths Group. The University of Manchester is the fourth largest university investor in BAE System with 168, 000 shares.