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Friday Fax  September 18, 2008 | Volume 11, Number 40 Dear Colleague,    Today we report on a senior UN official’s thinly-disguised salute to population control on the 40th anniversary of the publication of Paul Erlich’s alarmist manifesto The Population Bomb.  She combines this with a call for “destigmatizing” – in other words, “legitimizing” – sodomy, intravenous drug use and prostitution.     We also give you a heads up on what to expect this Fall from the United Nations General Assembly, where a push to expand homosexual and abortion rights is anticipated.  As always, the Friday Fax will keep you informed.          Spread the word.       Yours sincerely,   Austin Ruse President Top UN Official Applauds Plummeting Births, Calls for Protection of Sodomy By Susan Yoshihara, Ph.D.               (NEW YORK – C-FAM) At United Nations headquarters last week, UN Population Fund (UNFPA) executive director Thoraya Obaid called for more funding for population programs, including reducing fertility, promoting “reproductive health services,” and “de-stigmatizing” sodomy.      Obaid began her remarks by commemorating the 40th anniversary of Paul Erlich's book, The Population Bomb, which alarmed readers about the threat of “overpopulation” and justified the establishment of UNFPA. While she admitted the book’s prediction of “massive starvation on a large scale has not come to pass,” she nonetheless called for renewed commitment to boilerplate population control policies such as promoting smaller families, warning nations that world population had grown from 3.5 billion to 6.7 billion since 1968.       Obaid said there is a causal relationship between fertility decline and economic development, but this claim has been seriously challenged by the emerging evidence. A landmark study published earlier this year by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), for example, found that contrary to conventional wisdom, the “Asian Miracle,” in which economic development followed a drop in fertility, was the exception to the rule. It also showed why the world will become more violent and less secure in the next thirty years due in part to rapid changes in fertility rates.      The executive director called for more funding of “education and reproductive health” in line with UNFPA’s mandate from the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) outcome document “which,” Obaid told member states, “your governments have adopted.” Left unmentioned was the fact that ICPD explicitly safeguards each nation’s right to protect the unborn in their laws, and that it explicitly rules out abortion as a method of family planning.        The omission was especially notable since Obaid then said that “we need increased political will and teamwork to scale up quality reproductive health services,” a term interpreted by various UN agencies and human rights experts as including abortion. Specifically, she asserted that “we will not achieve MDG 5 [Millennium Development Goal for reducing maternal mortality] unless women have universal access to reproductive health.”  Nations have repeatedly rejected the inclusion of reproductive health in the MDGs, and Obaid notably dropped any reference to a new “target” for reproductive health, something that drew sharp rebukes from the US delegation in her last annual report.      Perhaps most controversial was Obaid’s claim, during her discussion of HIV prevention, that nations must “fight even harder against stigma and discrimination,” and included “men having sex with men," among marginalized groups needing special protection along with women and children. She then mentioned “forces that do not like our agenda,” claiming that “Threats are made against…UN family planning programs in particular.” She did not provide specifics, but said that “Our focus in 2008 has been to consolidate inter-faith networks for population and development,” and announced a UNFPA-sponsored Global Faith-Based Organization Forum in Istanbul next month to “enhance this strategic partnership.”      Obaid lauded the fact that UNFPA’s funding increased in 2008 by $50 million to a total of $470 million, and announced that UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon decided to extend her term in office by an additional two years. General Assembly Opens New Session; Will Face Challenges to Life and Family By Samantha Singson            (NEW YORK – C-FAM) Ambassador Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann of Nicaragua opened the 63rd session of the General Assembly (GA) this week at United Nations (UN) headquarters, stressing the international community’s responsibility to be “stewards of the earth.” Brockmann, a laicized priest, lamented the “deplorable state” of the world and charged that member states “have increasingly turned into arrogant landlords believing that we have absolute rights over what has been entrusted to our care and management for the good of all.”      Brockmann highlighted the problems of conflict, food insecurity, environmental degradation, and the global financial crisis and acknowledged that the UN has “an obligation to perform better.” He said that he would use his time as president of the GA to attempt to replace “the perverse logic of selfishness” with “the logic of love and inclusiveness.”      While the world’s media focuses on the "general debate" that will begin on September 22 with addresses from heads of state on pressing political and economic issues, conservative groups will be closely monitoring a number of social initiatives which seek to promote abortion and gay rights during the GA.      International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) and Marie Stopes International (MSI), two of the world’s most prominent abortion advocacy groups, have announced their intention to push for abortion rights at the GA this fall. In conjunction with the high level meeting on the Millennium Development Goals next week, IPPF intends to use its presence at the meeting to promote contraception and the “universal access to reproductive health by 2015,” even though states have never agreed to include “reproductive health” as part of the MDGs.      MSI will be presenting the signatures of its “safe abortion” campaign to the GA on the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights in December.  The campaign demands for “women’s access to legal, safe abortion to be recognized as a fundamental human right.”      Abortion will not be the only contentious issue to be discussed at this year’s GA. Earlier this month, Rama Yade, France’s Junior Minister of State for Foreign Affairs and Human Rights, announced France’s intent to push for homosexual rights in the General Assembly in December. France declared that it will submit a draft “declaration” calling for the global decriminalization of “homosexuality” directly to the GA, bypassing its Third Committee, where social issues such as abortion and sexual orientation are normally debated and negotiated extensively.      The GA’s Third Committee will convene in October, with over 80 resolutions on topics such as women and children’s rights, capital punishment, the family, the environment and the protection and promotion of human rights on the agenda. In past GA sessions, Third Committee resolutions have dealt with contentious issues relating to access to sexual and reproductive health services, sexual orientation and sex education for children.      The work of the 63rd session of the General Assembly and its main committees is expected to wrap up by the end of December.   For more news, visit us at www.c-fam.org.   Editor in Chief  –  Austin Ruse Managing Editor  –  Piero Tozzi Assistant Managing Editor  –  Hannah Russo Chief Correspondent  –  Samantha Singson Contributor  –  Susan Yoshihara © Copyright 2008 Permission granted for unlimited use. Credit required.

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