Trump Admin Keeps Pro-Abortion Language Out of United Nations Resolution on Women

International   |   Micaiah Bilger   |   Nov 4, 2019   |   5:00PM   |   New York, NY

The Trump administration’s life-affirming priorities are making an impact across the world.

Last week, it insisted on removing ambiguous abortion references in a United Nations Security Council resolution about supporting women in crisis and conflict, according to C-Fam. The pro-life organization described the move as a “victory” for human rights.

“It is a victory for the Trump administration, which has been pushing to eliminate the phrase ‘sexual and reproductive health’ from UN documents,” the pro-life organization stated. “It is a blow to Europeans who insist that abortion be funded as humanitarian aid.”

The ambiguous phrase showed up in UN documents under pro-abortion President Barack Obama’s administration. Pro-life advocates believe the phrase “sexual and reproductive health” is purposefully ambiguous to allow for abortion advocacy.

According to C-Fam:

The term “sexual and reproductive health” was allowed to proliferate as long as it could be kept ambiguous: pro-life, mostly developing, countries could claim it did not include abortion while still accepting reproductive health funding from donor nations.

The diplomatic bargain of deliberate ambiguity, worked out in the halls of UN negotiating rooms, is not enforced on the ground. Donors, mostly Europeans, who define the term as including abortion, include it in foreign aid. UN agencies and implementing partners use the ambiguity to include abortion even where it is restricted, and to advocate for further liberalization as a matter of rights, though it is not in any UN agency’s official mandate or any UN human rights treaty.

The United Nations often pushes abortion on demand, but the Trump administration has been working against the radical pro-abortion agenda.

Earlier this fall, the Trump administration encouraged countries to stand strong for the rights of unborn babies at the UN. In a letter leaked to the Guardian and reportedly signed by U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar, the United States urged countries to join a “growing coalition” in opposing the “harmful” pro-abortion agenda.

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The letter criticized the United Nations for using vague language that encourages countries to promote abortion and asked countries to join the U.S. to ensure that every nation can “determine the best way to protect the unborn and defend the family as the foundational unity of society vital to children thriving and leading healthy lives.”

In 2017, Trump officials also stopped funding a United Nations agency linked to forced and coerced abortions. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) “partners on family planning activities with the Chinese government agency responsible for these coercive policies,” the administration said in defense of its decision. China’s oppressive one child policy, recently changed to a two-child limit, has led to forced and coerced abortions up through nine months of pregnancy, as well as forced and coerced sterilizations.

In April, Trump officials also intervened to stop the UN from supporting abortion in a resolution to protect victims of rape.

The Trump administration has been changing national and international policies to prioritize real human rights issues, including protections for unborn babies. In 2018, the State Department removed references to the so-called “right” to abort an unborn baby from a global human rights report.

Trump also reinstated and expanded the Mexico City Policy, which prohibits taxpayer funding to groups that promote or provide abortions overseas. The change defunded Planned Parenthood’s international arm of about $100 million and the British-based abortion chain Marie Stopes International of about $73 million.