Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin, Executive Director of the United Nations Population Fund, has published and editorial that extols the passage of the Philippines Reproductive Health Act. He argues that “family planning is a long established human right” and makes a claim for “reproductive rights,” and asserts that it is necessary to “tear down . . . barriers that prevent [people] from accessing information and services.”
Tag: United Nations
UN Population Fund makes rights claims
The U.N. Population Fund’s annual report claims that access to birth control is a human right. The report has no legal significance, but activists like the American based Center for Reproductive Rights have pursued a strategy of seeking such declarations, or “soft norms,” in the hope that they will eventually lead to binding “harde norms” that can be enforced against governments and objecting health care workers. (See Secret Memos Reveal Worldwide Pro-Abortion Legal Strategy)
UN Human Rights Commission demands suppression of freedom of conscience
The UN Human Rights Commison has issued a document that purports to base the restriction or suppression of freedom of conscience among health care workers on human rights claims. Technical guidance on the application of a human rights based approach to the implementation of policies and programmes to reduce preventable maternal morbidity and mortality. Section 30 of the document calls for changing laws and policies that allow conscientious objection “to hinder women’s access to a full range of services.” Section 61 states that laws, polices and regulations that allow “unregulated conscientious objection” should be changed, and “newly established obligations of providers and rights of individual users should be disseminated.” The resolution was endorsed by New Zealand, Burkina Faso, and Colombia and enumerates access to abortion among “sexual and reproductive health rights.” 20 of the 47 council members opposed the text. The UN General Assembly will consider adopting it later in October. [CFAM]
UNESCO official suggests mandatory registration of physicians who object to abortion
The UNESCO Chair in Bioethics at the University of Barcelona held a seminar on “Abortion and conscientious objection” in early February. The Chair’s director, Maria Casado, told the press that Spain should establish a national registry of physicians who object to abortion as a method of ensuring access to the procedure. While she claimed to support a right to conscientious objection, she said that “When [it] is transformed into a collective stance for ideological reasons, it turns into civil disobedience.” [ELN]
Wealthy western nations attacking protection of conscience at the UN
Japan, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the European Union are reported to be trying to make it illegal for health care workers to decline to perform abortions for reasons of conscience. The negotiations at the Beijing +5 conference are said to have broken down when Nicaragua proposed strong language to protect conscientious objectors. If accurate, these reports indicate that the US, Australia and New Zealand are attempting to impose on third world countries policies that are not acceptable in their own, since all three countries have enacted protection of conscience legislation for their own health care workers.