The
44th General Assembly of the Organization of American States (OAS)
took place in Asunción, Paraguay with the theme “Development
with Social Inclusion”. Radical NGOs attend this annual meeting in large
numbers but this year they were challenged by over 50 pro-life and pro-family
organizations from the Americas. Human Life International’s (HLI) report
includes an account of what transpired at the meeting. Pro-life
representatives at a civil society forum were able to dialogue with the OAS
Secretary General (SG) Jose Miguel Insulza on “the need to protect the life of
the unborn from procured abortion, the need to help mothers with crisis
pregnancies, and the need to respect the institution of the family as the
primary cell of society.”
HLI reports that
Secretary General Insulza while initially not wanting to respond to questions
related to abortion said that “he did not personally favor abortion but that it
was a reality in society that needs to be accepted and addressed.”
Pro-life and pro-family NGOs were allotted table space by OAS officials who
labeled the table “The Pro-Life and Pro-Family Table”. This action encountered
immediate opposition from radical NGOs who were intolerant of the diverse views
expressed by life and family civil society and tried unsuccessfully to silence
them.
The pro-life
coalition developed a statement that symbolized the unity of purpose of the
large number of organizations gathered in Asunción to defend life, family, and marriage. The statement
was submitted to the SG Jose Miguel Insulza, Eladio Loizaga,
Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Paraguay, and country
ambassadors and representatives who were in attendance.
The statement
called on the OAS to strengthen a list of points that included:
- The Family – The
family is the foundation of society and must be protected in an integral
manner…
- The Right to
Life—The human right to life must be recognized from conception to natural
death, being the foundational right from which all other rights come forth. We
express a resounding “NO” to procured abortion.
- Marriage – The
stable union between one man and one woman must be promoted, strengthened, and
protected as the basis for the institution of marriage for the purposes of
procreation and mutual support…
- The inclusion of
public policies that strengthen programs and projects that are being developed
in the areas of post-abortion syndrome, pregnant mothers in situations of
vulnerability, children and families in conflict situations, marriages in
crisis situations, and other social sectors in need of protection.
The official
documents that were adopted can be found here.
During
consideration of the resolution recommending the work of the monitoring body of
the OAS treaty on prevention of violence against women, Belém do Pará,
Guatemala and Ecuador issued reservations in the form of a footnote to
declare that, “pursuant to their respective domestic legislation, they
recognize the right to life from the moment of conception.” This was to clarify
that in regards to the call for states to “promote, though technical
cooperation with national machineries for the advancement of women and other
government bodies, the adoption of protocols for guaranteeing that women
victims of violence have access to justice”, these countries will not allow
abortion. The Committee of Experts of the treaty monitoring body MESECVI
has recommended in the document Regional
tools to fight violence against women: The Belém do Pará and Istanbul
Conventions the legalization of
“interruption of pregnancy on therapeutic grounds, whether to save the life of
the mother or to prevent serious or permanent injury to her physical and mental
health” and legalization of “the interruption of pregnancy caused by rape”.
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