< < <
Date Index > > > |
NYTimes.com Article: U.N. Forum Stalls on Sex Education and Abortion Rights by swsystem 10 May 2002 13:21 UTC |
< < <
Thread Index > > > |
This article from NYTimes.com has been sent to you by swsystem@aol.com. Interesting line-up of countries at the UN special session on children. Steven Sherman "During the negotiations over wording, American officials have pressed for specificity — demanding, for instance, that the term "reproductive health services" be annotated to exclude abortion. In this they are joined by the Vatican, as well as several Islamic nations, from Iran to Pakistan. On the opposing side are delegates representing the European Union, as well as countries in Latin America, Africa and Asia." swsystem@aol.com /-------------------- advertisement -----------------------\ Enjoy new investment freedom! Get the tools you need to successfully manage your portfolio from Harrisdirect. Start with award-winning research. Then add access to round-the-clock customer service from Series-7 trained representatives. Open an account today and receive a $100 credit! http://www.nytimes.com/ads/Harrisdirect.html \----------------------------------------------------------/ U.N. Forum Stalls on Sex Education and Abortion Rights May 10, 2002 By SOMINI SENGUPTA UNITED NATIONS, May 9 - Differences over abortion and sex education continued to distance the Bush administration from many of the other delegates to a General Assembly Special Session on Children today, complicating efforts to draft a final declaration due on Friday. Delegates prepared to negotiate through the night to meet the deadline for a document that outlines goals and standards on issues ranging from child labor to immunizations. The three-day session is the General Assembly's first devoted exclusively to children. Sex has proved the most contentious topic. The United States delegation, upholding the White House stance against abortion, seeks to amend language arrived at in previous United Nations conferences so that it excludes abortion from the menu of reproductive health services offered to teenagers. Since in some countries abortion is one of a range of basic health services while in others it is against the law, language from previous conferences contained no proscriptions against it, holding only that in countries where the service is legal, it ought to be safe. During the negotiations over wording, American officials have pressed for specificity - demanding, for instance, that the term "reproductive health services" be annotated to exclude abortion. In this they are joined by the Vatican, as well as several Islamic nations, from Iran to Pakistan. On the opposing side are delegates representing the European Union, as well as countries in Latin America, Africa and Asia. The American delegation has also pressed for language promoting abstinence for unmarried youths. The delegation's head, the Bush administration's secretary for health and human services, says abstinence is "the only sure way of avoiding sexually transmitted disease, premature pregnancy and the social and personal difficulties attendant to nonmarital sexual activity." Critics accused the United States of trying to withhold life-saving tips about sexually transmitted diseases, including H.I.V., which is swiftly spreading among the young, particularly in the developing world. "We are really stuck," said Eveline Herfkens, the Dutch development minister, "because one or two governments - one of them this country - wants to renegotiate commitments we made in previous conferences. Others, like us, feel it's unacceptable. I feel it's irresponsible." The European Union delegation, as well as those from many Asian, African and Latin American countries, favors maintaining earlier language. "I think we should keep all the agreements we have done so far," the Finnish president, Tarja Halonen, said at a briefing with reporters this afternoon. "This special session is supposed to take steps forward." Responding to the criticism this afternoon, an American official said, "We are trying to lead the world." The official added that the American delegation had pressed for stronger language on child pornography and prostitution - efforts that he contended had been drowned out by attention to the abortion fight. Negotiations were expected to continue until consensus is reached. "It's a countdown now," said Dirk Rotenberg, spokesman for the German mission to the United Nations. "No one is allowed to go home. If we reach a text no one is happy with, that would be a good compromise." Germany is leading the negotiations. Though sex dominated the closed-door debates over the conference document, the dozens of panels, briefings and luncheons here took up a range of equally important and sometimes bitterly contested issues. Arab nations pushed for a resolution declaring that children in Israeli-occupied territories remained "deprived of many basic rights"; a senior Israeli official shot back by accusing Palestinians of recruiting teenagers as suicide bombers. The United Nations high commissioner for refugees, Ruud Lubbers, used the occasion to highlight his office's efforts to combat reported sexual exploitation of refugee children by relief workers. The reports have emerged recently from Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, where interviews indicate that some aid workers exchanged food rations for sex with children. An investigation into these reports is continuing. Mr. Lubbers said this morning that one way the agency was combating the problem was by having only women distribute food rations. Perhaps one of the most poignant and politely contentious sessions was one in which African children sat face to face with representatives of their governments. "We must put an end to this demagoguery," a 15-year-old from Mali, Adam Maiga, told a room packed with heads of state. "You have parliaments, but they are used as democratic decorations." Joseph Tamale, 12, from Uganda, lit into the group on debt servicing. Who will pay those big loans when they come due in 20 or 30 years? asked Joseph, a boy with braces, swimming inside his denim jacket. "It will be us," he answered. "And we have nothing to pay them with, because when you get the money, you embezzle it, you eat it." Gael Mbemba, 17, from Chad, begged them, his hands bouncing off the table in front, to carry out their promises back home. If you want to set up schools, he told them bluntly, make sure you have a teacher, a library. The promises of the past, he added, had left him disenchanted. "The result is not what you said, which is we are worried," Gael told them. "Listen to the children not with your ears, but with your hearts." http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/10/international/10CHIL.html?ex=1022044536&ei=1&en=f492d8ae42de8954 HOW TO ADVERTISE --------------------------------- For information on advertising in e-mail newsletters or other creative advertising opportunities with The New York Times on the Web, please contact onlinesales@nytimes.com or visit our online media kit at http://www.nytimes.com/adinfo For general information about NYTimes.com, write to help@nytimes.com. Copyright 2002 The New York Times Company
< < <
Date Index > > > |
World Systems Network List Archives at CSF | Subscribe to World Systems Network |
< < <
Thread Index > > > |