The Pope Versus Condoms and the Pills
The Holy See, by having an observer status at the UN unlike many other religions, has made it possible for the Catholic Church to play active roles in many international conferences organized by the United Nations. During the last two decades of my work with the United Nations, I had seen delegations sent by the Vatican, energetically involved in the negotiations of Plans, Programmes or Platforms of Action of key UN Conferences since the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, the 1993 Vienna Conference on Human Rights, the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development, the 1995 World Summit for Social Development, and the 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women which I was officially assigned to work in the preparatory process. The Church took high profile position at the 1995 Bejing Conference on Women to influence representatives of the governments, non-governmental organizations and the media by propagating the text of the encyclical “Humanae Vitae”, a conservative Church dogma created by Pope Paul VI in 1968 aiming to ban birth control. The Vatican delegation fought tooth and nails with many progressive NGOs and women’s groups when they promote the use of condoms and birth control pills in family planning programmes and campaigns to prevent HIV/AIDS. According to “Humanae Vitae”, using artificial birth control such as the pills and condoms works against the Church’s concept of “marriage” which is to “foster love between partners in order to produce children”. All through the two-year process of preparations of the World Conference on Women, Vatican Spokesmen tried every means to influence the negotiated text of the Platform for Action, a document that the participants agreed to issue to the World when the Conference ended. They targeted for attack the agenda items on reproductive healths, reproductive rights, women’s rights and gender equality. Three months before opening of the Beijing World Conference on Women, Pope John Paul II sent a letter the Conference’s Secretary-General, Gertrude Mongella, to make a strong point that according to the Church’s outlook, “Women and men have been called by the Creator to live in profound communion with one another, with reciprocal knowledge and giving of self, acting together for the common good with the complementary characteristics that which is feminine and masculine. No response to women’s issues can ignore women’s role in the family or take lightly the fact that every new life is totally entrusted to the protection and care of the women carrying in it in her womb”. In the same letter the Pope continued to say that “in order to respect this natural order of things, it is necessary to counter the misconception that the role of motherhood is oppressive to women, and that a commitment to her family, particularly to her children, prevents a woman from reaching personal fulfillment, and women as a whole from having an influence in society”. On this subject, I recently read an article by John Allen Jr., the senior correspondent for the National Catholic Reporter and the author of “The Rise of Benedict XVI, on the Pope vs. the Pill . I disagree with him when he said that Catholicism can and does change. For me, I see no evidence that the Church can change. It seems to me that Catholic Church authorities would rather look the other way than face the facts that, in following the Church’s teaching against the use of condoms and pills, youth around the world are dying every day because of HIV/AIDS, and millions of women are sinking deeper every day into a blackhole of poverty because of producing too many children to feed and care for.
Filed under United Nations, World Affairs | Comment (0)“Ruffling Feathers Is Part of the Job Of UN High Commissioner for Human Rights”
This is what Louis Arbor of Canada, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said before she left the office in June. Coming to this position from her previous job as Chief Prosecutor to the UN War Crimes Tribunal, she was known to have ruffled some feathers by taking a tough stance on the human rights record of some countries, especially those sitting on the Human Rights Council. Judge Navanethem Pillay of South Africa, Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon’s nominee as the new High Commissioner for Human Rights, has just been confirmed by consensus by the United Nations General Assembly to begin her work in Geneva on the 1st of September. Qualification for this post, according to the General Assembly, is that a person has to be of high moral standing with personal integrety and possess expertise in the field of human rights and the general knowledge and understanding of diverse cultures necessary for impartial, objective, non-selective and effective performance of her duties. Judge Pillay will carry on her new job within the framework of the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. “Ruffling Feathers” is nothing new to her seeing from her background. She had many years of experience in fighting against Apartheid, domestic violence and other human right abuses in her country. She was put under South African Police surveillance when she successfully appealed to the provincial court which gave Mandela and his fellow inmates some very basic legal rights. Her new job as the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights will require more international diplomacy on the occasions that she will be called to defend victims of human rights abuses by their own government. She will be expected to make the existing human right machinery work in order to renew public confidence in the United Nations. As a global advocate for human rights, she has an important task to strengthen governmental and non-governmental institutions created for human rights education and training. The High Commissioner for Human Rights job is one of the most difficult jobs in the World with high expectations from all levels of society from local, regional and global. I want to join others in congratulating her for this important appointment and to wish her well in her important task of promoting values, beliefs and attitudes that encourage all individuals to uphold their own rights and those of others.
Filed under United Nations, World Affairs | Comment (0)Improving UN Performance for Gender Equality
In June, the United Nations General Assembly asked Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon to prepare a second concept note detailing the range of institutional options for improving the UN’s performance in gender-related activities. This timely request gives an opportunity for the Secretariat to assess its own performance as to the success and failure in meeting memberstates’ expectation, and the UN’s capacity to meet global commitment to the Millennium Development Goals and the implementation of the Security Council Relolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security. What lies behind this General Assembly’s request for a second concept paper was a disagreement among memberstates over the “UN Gender Architechture” recommendation of the 2006 High Level panel on System-wide Coherence, heavily lobbied by NGOs, which proposed a new UN entity on gender to be led by an Under-Secretary-General level post on gender and women’s rights. The Joint Coordinating Committee of the Group of 77 and Non-Aligned Movement, China and India do not support the creation of this new entity and high-level post proposal. I could not agree more with them. I see no need to spend our limited global resources in creating a new bureaucratic structure when the existing ones are already doing quite a good job. And in addition, in my judgement, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and its Committee are also doing an excellent job in monitoring the implementation of the treaties on women’s rights and the reviewing of country’s reports. As far as the UN leadership in this matter is concerned, the Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, himself, and Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro, have done their best to move the World’s action towards gender equality, and at the same time, have tried to improve UN capacities in assisting memberstates to fill their needs and the identified gaps. The UN Secretariat already has many competent senior level staff to work on this gender issues such as Ms. Rachel Mayanja, Assistant Secretary-General, Adviser on Gender Issues and Advancement of Women, and Ms. Carolyn Hannan, Director, Division on the Advancement of women. These existing UN offices should be strengthened with more resources to increase their capacities to assist memberstates as and when needed. The responsibility for achieving gender equality really lies within the countries themselves.
Filed under Gender Issues, United Nations | Comment (0)Illusion of Virginity
In France, people are debating over Islam and Virginity. They focus on the virginity repair operation provided by private clinics for a price of around $3000 per one semicircular cut plus 10 dissolving stitches. Young Muslim girls living in Europe are customers of the hymenoplasty service to restor their hymen before the wedding night. This “illusion of virginity” is important for the girls, who want to be married in a Muslim tradition, because Muslim men have a traditional expectation of “breaking the bride’s hymen” at first intercourse of the wedding night. After one such operation, a girl said that virginity is more important to her than life. To be married, Muslim girl has to go to the extreme of getting a “Certificates of Virginity” to proof to friends and families, especially the groom’s family. When done properly by a qualified cosmetic surgeons, hymen replacement cannot be detected and produce the expected vaginal bleeding on the wedding night. This effort by Muslim girls to recapture their virginity is sociological significant in the modern life of big cities, not only in Europe and North America, but also in other Islamic mediteranean countries where girls have freedom of movement and sexal encounter at early ages. But the marriage rituals are based on an archaic tradition of treating the female body (not the male body) as sexual object. Muslim societies do not expect the men to be a “virgin” on Wedding day. This kind of debate is long overdued, not just in France, but a in all Muslim states that have officially opted for a democratic, egalitarian society. There is a contradiction between what the states advocate in the economic and social field at the various United Nations gatherings, and the decisions made in the sexual- rights and reproductive health. The demand for Muslim women to put on veil or to be a virgin on the wedding night represents the denial of the economic dimension and human right to self-determination of the women. Right now there are several court cases in France on this issue of virginity repair operation. Several marriages had be annulled after the groom found out that the bride went through hymenoplasty operation. The debate in the French Parliament touches on subjects such as the ground for dissolution of a marriage, equality of the sexes, and the intrusion of religion into modern daily life. Muslim women have to liberate themselves from the “Virginity Myth” first before they could think of achieving the United Nations Millennium development goal of gender equality.
Filed under Gender Issues, United Nations | Comment (0)“Responsibility to Protect”/ Nargis Cyclone Victims
To speed up global assistance for the victims of the Nargis Cyclone in Myanmar, the UN Secretary-General Ban Kee Moon will travel to the country this Wednesday. Diplomatic persuasion is the best way to handle the sensitive situation in Myanmar. Many people have rightly criticized the behavior of the Myanmar’s military leaders in their reluctant to allow foreign aid volunteers, or “the Good Samaritans” to come into the country to help with this gigantic emergency situation. But we must understand that there is pride involved here. Government officials want to show that they can handle the distribution of foods, tents, clothes and medicines to the people themselves with only the help of neighboring countries like India, Thailand and China. It is their right to decide to do things their way. I am certain that the United States Government would behave the same way in this kind of situation. Just imagine, a planeload of Chinese Buddhists and Indian Hindus insisted on flying into New Orleans to help the people directly during the Hurricane Katrina. I am quite certain that the US Government would not let them into the area without its permission. And yet, right now, we see the US and French navy ships sailing off the coast of the Irrawaddy delta. The French Foreign Minister, Bernard Kouchner ignited a firestorm around the United Nations by invoking the “Responsibility to Protect” principle to force the government of Myanmar to accept humanitarian aid. The “Responsibility to Protect” principle does not apply to “natural disaster” or as some people called “the Act of God”. Countries that accepted this principle of intervention by international community only when it applied to crimes against humanity, war crimes, and ethnic cleansing. We will have chaos if one country can barge into other countryon any emergency without the permission of national authority, no matter of what form of government the country has. Respect of International Law and country’s sovereignty are key elements of the United Nations Charter.
Filed under United Nations, World Affairs | Comment (0)Art, Climate Change, and Human Security
An Art exhibition, under this theme, which takes place this week in the South Gallery of the Visitors’ Lobby at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, is a great boost for people to change intolerance attitudes towards caring for the environment and human security. Seven contemporary artists, representing Africa, Asia and the Pacific, Latin America and the Caribbean, Europe and North America and Western Asia, contribute their art works for public display. Mia Hanak, Executive Director of the Natural World Museum, said that the exhibition seeks to use the universal language of art as a catalyst for action and social change. She hopes that art will trigger an emotional response on environmental issues and climate change, usually are presented in a dry scientific ways. Catherine Chalmers’ and Cecilia Paredes’ arts explore the links between human and animal world, while the other artist, Subhankar Banerjee, prefers to show his artistic photographs depicting the Arctic and the life of indigenous peoples of the North. These artists, environmental activists and scientists are attending a seminar and panel discussions to find creative approaches in dealing with climate change and human security in a holistic way. Together they have an opportunity to share strategies relating to ways in which communities and government around the World can use art to promote changes in their own cultures and the different ways of life. The Outreach Division of the United Nations Department of Information and the United Nations Environment Programme, who organized this event, are doing an excellent job. The exhibition is open to the public until the end of May.
Filed under Art, United Nations | Comment (0)Sufficient Financing For Gender Equality
The importance of sufficient financing for gender equality and women’s empowerment cannot be overstated. During the last ten years, 50 countries have launched the gender-responsive budgeting. But changes in budget policies and allocation are slow, with very little measurable impact. This week, representatives of member governments of the United Nations come together in New York to participate in the 52nd Session of the Commission on the Status of Women. The discussions focus on
financing for gender equality and empowerment of women. They identified that a big obstacle to achieving gender-targeted financing is the lack of a political will by political leaders, the majority of which are men. “Men just turn off when they hear the term gender equality believing it meant women fighting only for their representation not equally representation of both men and women” says one delegate. Most politicians are not gender-sensitive; they sometimes claimed that they could not include gender in their projects because women and men must be treated equally and that gender inequality is not an obstacle to development. The false assumption that men and women act the same way as economic agent and benefit equally from the provision of public goods has produced the “neutral” character of Government budget. This false belief is another obstacle to gender-sensitive budgeting. Without being able to exercise their sexual and reproductive rights, and without access to adequate sexual and reproductive health services, women stand little chance of having the same opportunities as the men. Investment in reproductive health is key to a sustainable social and economic development, and to the protection and promotion of human rights. What gender-sensitive financing really aimed at are the reform of a country’s public sector finance and the fairer distribution of wealth. It is important, therefore, for governments to examine all policies from tax laws to general budgets through a “gender –lens” in order to ensure that the gender perspective is mainstreamed across budget procedure, law drafting and other major project from the very beginning. This will require the Ministry of Finance of each country to develop a national system of “gender-budgeting” in order to establish coherence between economic and social policies to achieve a long-term objective of gender equality, democracy, and sustainable development.
Women and Decision-making
Two months ago, the United Nations Division for the Advancement of Women invited me to participate in an online Seminar on “ Women and Decision-making”, a follow-up to the Platform of Action of the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, China, in 1995. The global community stressed the importance of women assuming positions of power and influence because despite the widespread movement for democracy, women were largely underrepresented in most governments especially in ministerial and other executive bodies. I learnt from discussions that the situation of women’s participation in decision-making has not changed much. Also from my own observation, today, the majority of women still remain outside most important decision-making arenas that effected their political, economic, and social lives, except in Scandinavian countries. But Dianne Lockwood, a participant of the UN seminar from Australia, surprised me of the progress in her country. In cultivating women leaders, she said that change happens because her government has a genuine commitment to gender equality. She reported that in the last decade, there had been considerable effort by Australia’s Federal Government to increase women’s leadership role. Now women hold one third of all Commonwealth parliamentary positions that give clout where it counts. Australian women hold 12% of all executive managerial positions in the private sectors, 35% of senior executive positions in the Public Service, and have 34.3% of all seats on government-controlled boards and bodies. Last year, the Australian government provides about 180 rural young women with leadership and role model opportunities through mentoring and leadership program pilots. Grants have been given to increase women’s leadership in sports and several key forums and “think thanks” to give women a voice. In addition, women were given a chance to have input into government policy through four National Women’s Secretariats funded by the government. I want to say that the progress in Australia happened because of many years of action taken by the women themselves, combined with efforts by the non-governmental organizations in lobbying their government to achieve the goal of equal participation of women and men in decision-making in the country. For me, women’s equal participation in decision-making is not only a demand for simple justice or democracy but also a necessary condition for women’s interests to be taken into account.
Filed under Gender Issues, United Nations | Comment (0)Preference For Sons - Girls Gone Missing
Preference for sons has long been part of Asian’s culture and tradition based on believing in male-superiority in society. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) alerts us that one of the most alarming change in Asia’s population dynamics in recent decades has been a dramatic increases in the proportion of males within its local populations. There is now an average of 120-130 male born for every 100 female born per year in India and China and similar trend in other countries. At the Fourth Asia Pacific Conference on Reproductive and Sexual Health and Rights, held in Hyderabad, India, two months ago, UNFPA presented the study “Sex-ratio Imbalance in Asia: Trends, Consequences, and Policy Responses”. After analyses of the consequences of the growing gender imbalances in the population of four studies conducted in India, China, Viet Nam and Nepal, the participants came to a conclusion that gender discrimination, son preference and the resultant unequal status of women and girls have contributed to an increasing demand for sex selection services. As a way forward, they recommended that governments and civil-society organizations should take priority action to eliminate sex selection. I agree that sex selection, with assistance from new ultrasound and amniocentesis technology, can lead to the problem of “Girls Gone Missing” through the abortion of female fetus. But I disagree with their way forward recommendation to elimination sex selection altogether. Stopping the abortion of female fetus, as practiced by a small group of women in the population, is not the same as stopping all the people from sex selection/services and access to information and technology. It is wrong for the participants to encourage governments and civil society organizations to take action against the right of parents to have the freedom to choose the size of their own family, the sex of their child, and the use of modern technology to improve the quality of their own lives. I have been working for years in population information, education and communication field in programs and projects where sex selection information was provided freely to parents along with information on family planning methods. We should keep the free flow of information to the people, especially, when we see success such as the Thailand Family Planning Program, which is based on the provision of unrestrictive information makibg use of available modern technologies. Authoritarian force must not be used by anyone to solve the problem of missing girls in the population. Instead we should use persuasive methods and give advice on appropriate technology for sex selection, while at the same time, provide gender equality and human rights education for all people from childhood to adulthood. Parents will then be able to make their own free choice about the number and sex of their children based on knowledge and understanding of the equal value of the male and female child. Without change in respecting women’s integrity and their right to be in charge and control of their own body, authoritarian government and religious authority will not succeed in stopping the women to abort female fetus from their own body.
Filed under Gender Issues, Thailand, United Nations | Comment (0)Dignity and Justice For All
In six days, we will be celebrating the 60th Anniversary of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. And yet last month we heard disturbing news on human rights abuse in Saudi Arabia.. a 19 years old girl, identified as “Qatif girl”, has to spend six month in jail and suffered 200 lashes because she was gang raped. This action by the Saudi Court is violence against women. I join friends in the Human Rights Watch around the world to urge the Saudi King Abdullah to void the verdict and drop all charges against “Qatif girl” and other rape victims. Human rights issues include women’s right, arbitrary detention, and discrimination on the ground of sex. On 10 December, the Human Rights Day, Ban Ki-Moon, the United Nations Secretary-General will ask all of us around the world to take part in the campaign to celebrate 60 years that the world has come together to recognize the importance of respect of civil and political rights of each person, including economic, social and cultural rights. There are many ways for all of us to join in this campaign and bring about dignity and justice to women and men, no matter where they live. There are more than 50 ideas for commemorating the Universal Declaration of Human Right. Any of us can pick and choose to act from them as suggested by the human rights educators from five continents at their 1997 meeting. We can celebrate 2007 Human Right Day by joining force to help the Saudi woman fights gang rape ruling.
Filed under Gender Issues, United Nations, World Affairs | Comment (0)