UN Attempts To Exploit COVID-19 To Push Abortion

by Elyssa Koren: The federal government has taken a bold pro-life stand against the United Nations bureaucracy in asserting that “international human rights law does not recognize any ‘right to abortion.’” This declaration comes in response to a May 27 letter sent to the United States from the U.N. Working Group on Discrimination Against Women and Girls claiming that the U.S. was impinging on a so-called “right to abortion” as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In delivering a powerful response, the U.S. has taken the opportunity to take two extremely important actions. First, it has clarified that abortion is not a “human right.” Second, it has issued a strong rejection of the U.N.’s coercive bureaucratic reach. Both of these actions will have far-reaching effects beyond simply informing the U.N. of American opposition to its abortion agenda.

As evidence mounts that the U.N. is using its coronavirus relief aid to promote abortion, the crucial importance of U.S. resistance must be underscored. In standing up to the U.N., the U.S. defends not only its own sovereign integrity but also that of the many member states that often find themselves too vulnerable to U.N. pressures to fight back.

Ecuador, for instance, which received $8 million in U.N. COVID-19 aid with a provision that it legalize abortion, will undoubtedly benefit from the U.S.’s pro-life assertion. Abortion is illegal in Ecuador, and yet the U.N. delivered box abortion kits as part of its “Minimum Initial Service Package“ for humanitarian relief.

The Working Group letter, referenced by the U.S. as “bizarre and inexplicable,” singled out pro-life measures in Texas, Oklahoma, Alabama, Iowa, Ohio, Arkansas, Louisiana, and Tennessee. Its claim is that these states “with a long history of restrictive practices against abortion, appear to be manipulating the [COVID-19] crisis to severely restrict women’s reproductive rights.” Delving into the pro-life policies of not only a sovereign country, but also of its individual states, represents a gross interference in our domestic affairs.

Abortion, as the U.S. made clear in its rebuttal, is not a matter of international jurisdiction. Moreover, it is critically important that the autonomy of our 50 states be protected. The U.N. has no right to meddle in the federal structure so core to the American democratic identity. It is severely inappropriate for the U.N. to attempt to override the domestic abortion debate transpiring at the state level in our country.

The U.S. is unequivocally correct — there is no right to abortion in international law. In fact, as indicated by the travaux preìparatoires of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, international law explicitly recognizes the unborn child’s human rights. Article 6(5) of the treaty protects the right to life of unborn children whose mothers have been sentenced to death. One could make a strong case for the opposite of what the U.N. contends: International law, in fact, mandates the protection of the right to life for everyone at all stages of life.

The U.S. response states that U.N. efforts to promote abortion are “a perversion of the human rights system and the founding principles of the United Nations.” This is exactly right. The international human rights project, created in the aftermath of World War II, was launched to deal with the real and pressing human rights abuses. The U.S., in its letter, references U.N. inaction with regard to, among others, forced abortion in China as evidence of its misdirected and hypocritical focus. As the U.S. states, “the United Nations system ... has been notably quiet on this topic, even as they find ample opportunity to opine on matters of American domestic political concern.”

Not mincing words, the response emphasizes that the U.S. regards the human rights system of the U.N. as “utterly broken.” This is as a result of its penchant to promote false rights — “a practice that devalues the entire human rights enterprise and leads to absurd outcomes such as the above-referenced [Working Group] letter.” The tragic corollary of the U.N.’s myopic abortion promotion is a catastrophic disregard for the human rights violations that take place all around the world without redress.

As the draft report of the U.S. State Department Commission on Unalienable Rights recently made clear, the U.N. is not the appropriate venue for the hashing out of non-consensual agendas, such as abortion. The commission notes that the international human rights project is strongest when “grounded in principles so widely accepted as to be beyond debate” and “weakest when it is employed in disputes among competing groups in society over political priorities.” The solution is that controversial claims to new “rights” are best handled at the domestic level of each sovereign state.

The U.S. letter closes with a striking warning: “If you truly are concerned about the integrity of the United Nations human rights system, we urge you to reconsider the approach that has led you and your colleagues to this sad point, so far from the noble purpose for which this institution was founded 75 years ago.”

Restoring the integrity of the human rights project, so tarnished by U.N. missteps, demands that international institutions back off the promotion of controversial issues that should be handled by individual countries. Standing up for the right to life is essential if we are to secure the future of the human rights system.
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Elyssa Koren (@Elyssa_ADFIntl) is director of United Nations advocacy for ADF International.

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