CFAM Publications http://www.c-fam.org/rss/publications.asp This is publications from CFAM en-us (c) 2008 Thu, 03 Jul 2008 13:50:00 EST http://feedvalidator.org/docs/rss2.html www.eResources.com (Generator) webmaster@c-fam.org (CFAM) support@eresources.com (eResources) 60 Girl Scouts Distribute Planned Parenthood Sex Guide at UN Meeting http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1589 (NEW YORK – C-FAM)  The World Association of Girl Scouts and Girl Guides hosted a no-adults-welcome panel at the United Nations this week where Planned Parenthood was allowed to distribute a brochure entitled “Healthy, Happy and Hot.” The event was part of the annual United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) which concludes this week.

Happy, Healthy and HotThe brochure, aimed at young people living with HIV, contains explicit and graphic details on sex, as well as the promotion of casual sex in many forms.  The brochure claims, “Many people think sex is just about vaginal or anal intercourse… But, there are lots of different ways to have sex and lots of different types of sex. There is no right or wrong way to have sex. Just have fun, explore and be yourself!” The brochure goes on to encourage young people to “Improve your sex life by getting to know your own body. Play with yourself! Masturbation is a great way to find out more about your body and what you find sexually stimulating. Mix things up by using different kinds of touch from very soft to hard. Talk about or act out your fantasies. Talk dirty to them.”

]]> Thu, 11 Mar 2010 09:00:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1589 Competing Views on Maternal Mortality Reduction Clash at Beijing + 15 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1588 Minnesota and Ipas brochures

(NEW YORK – C-FAM)  Almost more than any topic, maternal morality has been the focus of this year’s meeting of the United Nations (UN) Commission on the Status of Women (CSW), which commemorates the fifteenth anniversary of the Beijing women's conference. While all agree on the need to improve maternal health and reduce maternal mortality, two main competing views on how best to do so have emerged – with one camp emphasizing abortion.

Stressing the importance for governments to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015, government delegations and UN officials have lamented the lack of progress on MDG 5, to improve maternal health. At the opening of the conference, Deputy Secretary-General Rachel Mayanja stated that there has been “limited progress on reproductive health” and that “maternal mortality remains unacceptably high.” Mayanja emphasized that “almost all these deaths could be prevented.”

]]> Thu, 11 Mar 2010 08:00:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1588 Women at Beijing +15 Agitate for More Funding of New UN Gender Super-Agency http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1583 (NEW YORK – C-FAM)  The annual United Nations (UN) Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) began this week in New York and marks the 15-year review of the Beijing Conference on Women (Beijing, 1995).



While governments are supposed to be meeting to examine national commitments to implementing the UN Millennium Development Goals, the fight so far has been over the structure and funding for a new women’s super-agency that would essentially subsume the four major existing UN institutions dealing with women’s and gender issues:  the Division for the Advancement of Women, the United Nations Development Fund for Women, the International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women, and the Office of the Special Advisor on Gender Issues. The wish is that women’s issues get the same institutional weight that children’s issues get from the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) even though much of UNICEF now focuses on women rather than children.

]]> Thu, 04 Mar 2010 12:39:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1583 UN Aging Report Warns of Dire Effects of Fertility Decline http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1584 (NEW YORK – C-FAM)  A recently-released United Nations (UN) report finds that the global trend of fertility decline and population aging will have devastating economic and societal effects on the developing world, particularly on women who are now targeted by UN agencies to further reduce fertility.

“World Population Ageing 2009” was published in December 2009 by the UN Population Division, a statistics research branch within the UN’s Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA).

]]> Thu, 04 Mar 2010 11:04:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1584 6,000 Expected at Annual UN Feminist Conference Starting Next Week http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1579 (NEW YORK – C-FAM)  Next week, thousands of participants are expected to descend upon the United Nations (UN) headquarters in New York for the annual Commission on the Status of Women (CSW). In anticipation of the meeting, radical feminist groups have been preparing statements and refining messages to push on government delegations at the meeting.

This year’s CSW is particularly significant because it marks the fifteenth anniversary of the Beijing Conference on Women.  At the original 1995 conference, advocates attempted to establish a “right” to abortion on demand but failed when governments specifically outlined that no new rights – particularly, no new “right” to abortion – were established at Beijing. Since then, however, abortion proponents have not given up their attempts to push abortion rights at CSW and during periodic reviews of the Beijing conference.

]]> Thu, 25 Feb 2010 12:57:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1579 New Report Shows American Law Firm Pushing Abortion on Africans http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1580 (NEW YORK – C-FAM)  The Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR), a New York-based public interest law firm that seeks to expand abortion access globally, has issued a primer on "reproductive and sexual rights" jurisprudence in Africa, including abortion.  Its launch comes at a time when largely western groups are increasing pressure on African nations to liberalize abortion laws.

"Legal Grounds: Reproductive and Sexual Rights in African Commonwealth Courts, Volume II" surveys a number of "reproductive rights" issues in countries that inherited a common-law legal system, and includes a chapter on "Abortion and Fetal Interests." It is intended as a tool for "women's rights advocates who seek to develop and strengthen litigation strategies at the national level."

]]> Thu, 25 Feb 2010 12:04:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1580 IPPF Africa Conference Pushes Abortion and Youth Sex http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1575 (NEW YORK – C-FAM)  Last week in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) hosted the 4th Africa Conference on Sexual Health and Rights. Plenary speakers included a United Nations (UN) Under-Secretary General, the Chairperson of the African Union Commission, the Executive Director of UNAIDS, the Chief of the UN Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) Africa Section, and the director of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) Liaison Office, as well as Dr. Jacqueline Sharpe, IPPF's President.

Major conference themes included promoting sexual education and sexual rights for young people, establishing closer links between “sexual rights” and “reproductive health rights,” transforming traditional cultural and religious norms about human sexuality, and advocating for legal abortion on demand throughout Africa.

]]> Thu, 18 Feb 2010 14:50:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1575 US Congressman Calls Upon UN Delegates to Respect Life http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1576 Congressman Christopher Smith(NEW YORK – C-FAM)  In a speech at the United Nations (UN) last week, veteran pro-life United States (US) Congressman Christopher Smith (R-NJ) addressed delegates from over 30 countries and urged them to respect the universal right to life as set forth in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, reminding them that the right to life should extend to unborn children.

Congressman Smith, the keynote speaker at a briefing organized by Focus on the Family, urged delegates to resist the push by UN agencies and non-governmental organizations to "legalize, facilitate and expand access to abortion" in their home countries.

]]> Thu, 18 Feb 2010 13:30:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1576 Chilean Maternal Mortality Study Undercuts Pro-Abortion Claims http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1571 Elard Koch(NEW YORK – C-FAM)  Preliminary findings by a prominent biomedical researcher examining the dramatic decrease in maternal mortality, over the past fifty years in the Latin American nation of Chile, appear to undercut claims by global abortion lobbyists that liberal abortion laws are necessary to reduce maternal mortality rates.

According Dr. Elard Koch, an epidemiologist on the faculty of medicine at the University of Chile, Chile's promotion of "safe pregnancy" measures such as "prenatal detection" and accessibility to professional birth attendants in a hospital setting are primarily responsible for the decrease in maternal mortality. The maternal mortality rate declined from 275 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births in 1960 to 18.7 deaths in 2000, the largest reduction in any Latin country.

]]> Thu, 11 Feb 2010 13:20:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1571 New UN Human Rights Treaty on Aging Promoted, Questioned http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1570 Co-authored by Emanuele Rizzardi

(NEW YORK – C-FAM) Last week at United Nations (UN) headquarters in New York, a federation of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) proposed a new "International Convention on the Rights of Older Persons" and a new special rapporteur for aging. The group included the powerful American lobby, American Association of Retired Persons (AARP).

The launch of the campaign for a new aging treaty took place at a panel discussion during the 48th Session of the Commission on Social Development, whose theme this year was social integration. In addition to AARP, the consortium included Age UK, Global Action on Aging, and International Association on Gerontology and Geriatrics.

]]> Thu, 11 Feb 2010 13:05:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1570 Pro-lifer Wins Christian Party Chairmanship http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1567 Co-authored by Emanuele Rizzardi

(NEW YORK – C-FAM)  Italian pro-life politician Luca Volontè captured the chairmanship of the European People’s Party (EPP) in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) last week, besting second-place finisher Jean-Claude Mignon of France, whom socially-liberal members had rallied around after their favored candidates faded.

Immediately upon assuming the chairmanship of the EPP, the chamber’s Christian Democratic grouping, Volontè was confronted with a number of challenges on controversial social issues. Due to coordinated EPP opposition, a report on "discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity" sponsored by Swiss socialist Andreas Gross was withdrawn and referred to the PACE Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights. Volontè had engineered a flood of some 70 substantive amendments to the bill, joined by Italian colleagues Renato Farina and Lorenzo Cesa, as well as Marco Gatti, representing San Marino, an independent microstate on the Italian peninsula.

]]> Thu, 04 Feb 2010 11:47:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1567 UN Member States Discuss New Women’s Super-Agency Details http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1566 (NEW YORK – C-FAM)  This week at the United Nations (UN), member states will start deliberating the details of the new "super" agency for women.  The General Assembly decided last fall to reform the current "gender architecture" by consolidating the UN's four existing departments on women and establish a new office, but details regarding the new entity's mandate, structure and funding have yet to be finalized.

In anticipation of these meetings, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon released a comprehensive proposal for the new entity last month, outlining a vision for the new office that includes a half-billion dollar budget, national, regional and international advocacy work and the creation of a new under-secretary-general position to accommodate the new office's executive director.

]]> Thu, 04 Feb 2010 11:28:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1566 New IPPF Document Pushes Adolescent "Sexual Rights" http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1563 Stand and Deliver(NEW YORK – C-FAM)  In its new report "Stand and Deliver," the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) is demanding that governments, religious institutions and society at large provide "comprehensive sexuality education" for children as young as ten years old.

In a foreword, Bert Koenders of the Development Cooperation of the Netherlands, which helped fund the publication, asserts that, "Young people have the right to be fully informed about sexuality and to have access to contraceptives and other services. These rights are enshrined in various internationally agreed human rights convention and treaties, but – unfortunately – they are still not universally respected."

]]> Thu, 28 Jan 2010 12:58:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1563 Top Legal Scholar Warns Abortion Issue Can Divide a Nation http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1562 Robert George(NEW YORK – C-FAM)  In Washington last Saturday night, a top legal scholar from Princeton University said that the United States (U.S.) Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion in 1973 led to deep societal divisions as well as to unprecedented political and religious alliances, which will be called on to lead a struggle for the “soul” of the nation once the decision is overturned.

“Abortion and embryo-destructive research are at the heart of the divide between the nation’s major political parties,” Professor Robert George said, galvanizing support for the pro-life plank in the Republican Party while drawing disaffected Democrats to the Republican camp. In response, “Barack Obama is trying to win over religiously serious Catholics and Evangelicals,” he said, who united around the pro-life cause, “without altering in the slightest his support for abortion, including late-term and partial-birth abortions.” Obama’s recent attempt to woo religious leaders has support among some left-leaning Catholics who argue that collaboration would lead to fewer abortions, a prospect George called “delusional.”

]]> Thu, 28 Jan 2010 12:35:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1562 Unsung Pro-Life Hero Retires from Senior Vatican Post http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1559 Cardinal Renato Martino(WASHINGTON, DC – C-FAM)  United Nations (UN) pro-lifers are saluting a man they consider one of the great, unsung heroes of the international pro-life and pro-family movements. Cardinal Renato Martino, longtime papal nuncio to the United Nations, has retired after 47 years of service to the Holy See, most of which was spent in the diplomatic service.

Cardinal Martino served as papal nuncio at the UN from 1986 to 2002, a period in which UN abortion debates reached their high water mark of divisiveness at the International Conference on Population and Development (Cairo, 1994) and the Fourth World Congress on Women (Beijing, 1995).

]]> Thu, 21 Jan 2010 09:40:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1559 Top Abortion Provider Cashes in on Haiti Crisis, Pro-Life Medics Respond http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1558 (NEW YORK – C-FAM)  Immediately after the earthquake that devastated Haiti last week, the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) used the crisis to solicit funds for its family planning clinics in the country. At the same time, a pro-life medical team arrived in Port au Prince to provide emergency medical services and skilled birth attendants. The responses highlight a rising dispute over the current United Nations (UN) program for reducing maternal mortality which puts fertility control first, a program in which Haiti has been a main target but has nonetheless maintained one of the world’s highest rates of maternal death.
 
Carmen Barroso, regional director for IPPF, the world’s top abortion provider, justified the fund drive for the IPPF affiliate, Profamil, saying “Since 1984, PROFAMIL has worked to improve sexual and reproductive healthcare in Haiti, often providing the only healthcare available in some areas.” Abortion is legal but highly restricted in Haiti. Profamil boasts delivering 600,000 condoms in a single year in 2005 and IPPF awarded the group for keeping up an aggressive contraceptive campaign from 2003-2005 during a period of political and economic instability.

]]> Thu, 21 Jan 2010 09:37:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1558 Secretary Clinton Announces 5-year Funding Push, Including Abortion http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1553

(NEW YORK – C-FAM)  In Washington last week, United States (U.S.) Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced that the United States would engage in a massive funding push over the next five years to promote “reproductive health care and family planning” as a “basic right” around the word. Clinton has previously stated for the record that this includes abortion. The plan includes potentially siphoning off funds currently directed towards fighting HIV/AIDs, tuberculosis and malaria.

Commemorating the fifteenth anniversary of the controversial International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo, Clinton said there were only five years left to achieve ICPD’s goal that “all governments will make access to reproductive healthcare and family planning services a basic right.”

]]> Thu, 14 Jan 2010 10:30:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1553 Battle for Christian Party Chairmanship in Council of Europe Draws Lines on Social Issues http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1554 Co-authored by Emanuele Rizzardi

Luca Volonte(NEW YORK – C-FAM)  A battle over leadership of the European People's Party (EPP), the Christian Democratic grouping in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), is pitting an Italian pro-life stalwart against socially-liberal counterparts from Holland and Sweden.

The leading social conservative candidate is Luca Volontè, currently the chairman of the Italian Christian Democratic caucus within the Italian national parliament. He is a long-time associate of Europe's best-known Catholic politician, Rocco Buttiglione, sharing similar political positions and collaborating in the promotion of academic workshops on Catholic social thought.

]]> Thu, 14 Jan 2010 10:00:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1554 General Assembly "Sexual Orientation" Vote Reveals Defection by Catholic Nations http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1549 (NEW YORK – C-FAM) An analysis of how countries voted with respect to novel non-discrimination categories based on "sexual orientation and gender identity" in a United Nations (UN) General Assembly (GA) resolution last month reveals an emerging global line-up on contentious social issues that has traditionally-Catholic nations aligned with social "progressives."

Voting to delete reference to a treaty body "General Comment" was a victorious coalition of socially-conservative nations centered in Africa, the Islamic world and parts of the English-speaking Caribbean.  The losing side was led by Global North nations – European Union states, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United States. What is significant, however, is the defection to this group by most traditionally-Catholic nations.

]]> Thu, 07 Jan 2010 13:23:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1549 IWHC Releases 2009 Top Ten Women’s Rights "Wins" http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1550 (NEW YORK – C-FAM) The abortion advocacy group, International Women's Health Coalition (IWHC), capped off 2009 by releasing its list of top ten "wins" on "women's health and rights." Apart from "reproductive rights" gains, the IWHC list also heralds victories on gay rights and the decriminalization of prostitution.

IWHC's definition of "reproductive rights" includes abortion, which the organization claims is "fundamental" to a woman's "ability to exercise her rights to control her body, to self-determination, and to maintain her health."

]]> Thu, 07 Jan 2010 13:14:00 EST Friday Fax Volume 13 http://www.c-fam.org/publications/pub_detail.asp?id=1550