Tuesday, November 10, 2026
News and Views from the Global South
POLITICS: U.S. Threat to Leave Population Pact ‘Devastating’
Thalif Deen
- The United States has come under fire for threatening to withdraw support from a landmark international agreement on population and development that it helped develop at a major United Nations conference in Cairo in 1994.
At a U.N. conference in Bangkok last week, the U.S. delegation announced that the United States would no longer support the Cairo Programme of Action unless two disputed terms were removed.
Both phrases – ”reproductive health” and ”reproductive rights” – are contained in the Programme of Action, which was adopted by consensus in Cairo by 179 countries, including the United States.
Right-wing groups that back U.S. President George W. Bush have argued that the two phrases are code words for abortion.
”The U.S. threat is an attempt to rewrite history and undo diplomatic agreements,” Werner Fornos, president of the Washington-based Population Institute, told IPS.
Fornos labelled the possible move by the Bush administration, ”a reprehensible retreat from reality”.
”What makes this move even more unfathomable is that it comes while the Bush administration is trying to drum up support from the international community on U.S. policy,” he said.
”It doesn’t exactly engender trust in promises by this administration when it is so willing to completely undermine agreements our country has made in other areas of international concern,” Fornos added.
So far, the Bush administration has refused to support several international agreements, including the Kyoto Protocol on climate change and one creating the International Criminal Court, while it has given notice of withdrawing from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (ABM).
Previous U.S. administrations have also been guilty of holding back support for international treaties, such as the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child and the convention against landmines.
In July, the administration, under pressure from the same right-wing groups said to have influenced the recent announcement, said it would withhold some 34 million dollars in already approved funding to the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) because it has been helping China in its policy of ”forced abortions”. The UNFPA has denied the charge.
The threat to withdraw support for the Cairo Programme of Action ”is the latest in a long line of politically driven setbacks for reproductive health and rights,” said Steven Sinding, director-general of the London-based International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF).
”This move would undermine a global consensus on population policy,” he said in an email message.
”The 1994 conference was hailed by supporters of women’s rights and advocates of checking population growth by giving women more control of their lives to control their own reproduction and help themselves out of poverty,” Sinding said.
Hiding behind the word ”abortion”, Bush is single-handedly attempting to roll back commitments made at this and previous world conferences and to ignore agreed-upon human rights and fundamental freedoms, he added.
Sinding also pointed out that the Bush administration has taken a series of steps to block funding for family planning programmes around the world, including to the UNFPA and IPPF.
”In doing so, it has denied U.S. funds to the two largest and most effective international organisations delivering family planning and reproductive health care to poor women around the world,” he added.
U.S. Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney, one of the strongest advocates of family planning among elected politicians, warned that ”repressive countries will follow the U.S. in its decision and the progress that has been made will cease”.
”The impact of these public statements is devastating and could undermine 10 years of work,” she added.
At several recent U.N. meetings, the Bush administration has gained support for its opposition to ”reproductive rights”, mostly from the Vatican and several conservative Muslim countries and strongly Catholic Latin American nations.
Fornos said the Cairo meeting, after heated deliberations, reached consensus that the terms ”reproductive rights” and ”reproductive health” did not mean ”abortion”.
According to him, ”to re-open the debate is counter-productive, and a blatant insult to poor women everywhere in the world”.
The ”ill-advised, ill-conceived and irresponsible move in the direction of rescinding international agreements eight years after the fact all adds up to a shameful charade that hammers the final nail in the coffin of something President Bush calls ‘compassionate conservatism’,” added Fornos.
A spokesman for UNFPA said the language of the Cairo Programme of Action ”should be maintained and preserved” because it was an internationally accepted agreement adopted by consensus.
Chief of External Relations Richard Snyder pointed out that the principles laid down in the Programme of Action take into account the political, religious and cultural sensitivities of different countries.
Chapter 2 says, ”the implementation of the recommendations contained in the Programme of Action is the sovereign right of each country, consistent with national laws and development priorities, with full respect for the various religious and ethical values and cultural backgrounds of its people, and in conformity with universally recognised international human rights”.
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POLITICS: U.S. Threat to Leave Population Pact ‘Devastating’
Thalif Deen
- The United States has come under fire for threatening to withdraw support from a landmark international agreement on population and development that it helped develop at a major United Nations conference in Cairo in 1994.
(more…)
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|
