  In the context of Thurstons geometrisation program we address the question
which compact aspherical 3-manifolds admit Riemannian metrics of nonpositive
curvature. We show that non-geometric Haken manifolds generically, but not
always, admit such metrics. More precisely, we prove that a Haken manifold
with, possibly empty, boundary of zero Euler characteristic admits metrics of
nonpositive curvature if the boundary is non-empty or if at least one atoroidal
component occurs in its canonical topological decomposition. Our arguments are
based on Thurstons Hyperbolisation Theorem. We give examples of closed
graph-manifolds with linear gluing graph and arbitrarily many Seifert
components which do not admit metrics of nonpositive curvature.
