U.S. urges U.N. group not to back abortion

UNITED NATIONS – Ten years after a U.N. conference adopted a platform aimed at global equality for women, the United States is demanding that a declaration issued by a follow-up meeting make clear that women are not guaranteed a right to abortion.

Starting today, a high-level U.N. meeting attended by more than 100 countries and 6,000 advocates for women’s causes will be taking stock of what countries have done to implement the 150-page landmark platform of action adopted at the 1995 U.N. women’s conference in Beijing to achieve equality of the sexes.

But even before the two-week meeting began, delegates were wrangling behind closed doors Friday on a draft declaration the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women put forward – and had hoped to have adopted by consensus before today’s opening session.

On Thursday, the United States said it could not accept the declaration because of its concerns that the Beijing platform legalized the right to abortion as a human right, according to several participants.

On Friday, the United States proposed an amendment to the draft declaration that would reaffirm the Beijing platform and declaration – but only “while reaffirming that they do not create any new international human rights, and that they do not include the right to abortion,” according to the text obtained by the Associated Press.

The Beijing platform calls for governments to end discrimination against women and close the gender gap in 12 areas including health, education, employment, political participation and rights.

At the 1994 U.N. population conference in Cairo, delegates approved a platform recognizing that abortion is a fact that governments must deal with as a public health issue. In Beijing the following year, delegates went further, asking governments to review laws that punish women for having abortions.

But attempts to approve stronger language on access to abortions failed in Beijing, and references to sexual rights and sexual orientation were dropped. But the Beijing platform stated for the first time that women have the right to “decide freely and responsibly on matters related to their sexuality … free of coercion, discrimination and violence.”

The Vatican and a few Islamic and Catholic countries opposed any references to abortion. The West and hundreds of rights activists supported them – including the U.S. government under President Bill Clinton.

President George W. Bush, has taken a tougher stand against abortion.