THE RELIGIOUS CONSULTATION
on population, reproductive health & ethics

Associated Press, June 29, 2004

Reports Issued at U.N. Conference Criticize U.S. Stance on Sexual Rights

BYLINE: FRANK GRIFFITHS; Associated Press Writer

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico -- Two reports by advocacy groups say the U.S. government's opposition to abortion and young people's use of condoms infringe on reproductive rights and are out of step with attitudes across Latin America, which is reviewing efforts to slow population growth.

One report, issued Monday by an international group of scholars from New York's Columbia University, criticizes U.S. President George W. Bush's administration for "a sweeping, comprehensive attack on sexual rights."

The Washington-based Catholics for a Free Choice issued results of polls in three Latin American countries that indicated the Vatican and the Bush administration are "out of step" for taking stances at Latin American meetings that oppose contraception while the vast majority of Catholics in Latin America support a full range of contraceptive methods.

The reports were published at the start of a five-day conference of the U.N. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, where delegates including a U.N. official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the United States is pressing Latin Americans to adopt more conservative policies on contraception - policies they say would slow development.

"There is the worry that if Bush is re-elected these policies will then be pursued even more violently, because politically there isn't anything to lose," said Richard Parker, a Columbia socio-medical sciences professor and co-chairman of the university's International Working Group on Sexuality and Social Policy.

The report also criticized the U.S. government for policies penalizing groups seeking to provide birth control options.

Bush in 2001 reinstated a policy barring aid to foreign nonprofit groups promoting abortions. Since 2002, the U.S. government has blocked US$34 million in annual aid to the U.N. Population Fund, saying it contributes to coerced abortions in China - a charge that agency denies.

A senior U.S. delegate said the report was an "unfair attack."

The official, who also spoke on condition of anonymity, said Bush believes strongly that while he wants to support reproductive health, including family planning, abortion can play no part, and that abstinence is a key to preventing sexually transmitted diseases among youths.

The United States paid for more than 300 million condoms to be distributed around the world last year, the official noted, saying the abstinence first campaign does not preclude use of condoms.

Some 300 delegates from 41 nations are at the meeting to consider progress in development, including through a plan adopted 10 years ago at a Cairo summit to slow growth in world population - then at 5.7 billion and now about 6.3 billion.

That summit won a surprising consensus for its demand of equality for women, including through access to modern birth control. While abortion and reproductive health were hotly disputed topics there, only a couple dozen countries expressed concerns on those issues, including Argentina, Ecuador, Peru and Paraguay.

On Monday, the Washington-based Catholics for a Free Choice called a news conference to highlight polls indicating the majority of Catholics in three countries respect their religion but believe they can ignore its abhorrence of birth control.

The vast majority of Catholics in Bolivia (76 percent), Colombia (83 percent) and Mexico (82 percent) support a full range of contraceptive methods, according to the polls the group commissioned.

Research firms conducted the surveys last year by questionnaire, consulting 2,328 Catholics in Mexico, 1,500 in Bolivia and 1,523 in Colombia. They reported an error margin of 2.5 percent or less.

"The Vatican has always claimed to speak for 1 billion Catholics worldwide. The truth is that it does not," Teresa Lanes Monte, the Catholic group's director in Bolivia, said of the polls.

<< Associated Press -- 6/29/04 >>