Conservative Document Endorsed by 700 NGOs Presented to UN Today

By C-FAM Staff

    (NEW YORK – C-FAM) The Heritage Foundation today presented a conservative document to the United Nations that was endorsed by more than 700 groups gathered by the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute (C-FAM) from all over the world. It was presented at the annual United Nations Department of Public Information Conference in New York and is meant to effect the ongoing negotiations over the Millennium Development Goals.

    The document challenges many liberal UN notions related to development. It puts forth a set of principles believed to be necessary for the achieving the MDG's broad goals such as international security, greater protection of human rights and economic development for developing countries.

    The document stresses that developing countries need more than international aid to end poverty. It declares that "economic freedom, good governance and the rule of law" are necessary for economic growth and that appropriate emphasis must be places on the role of the private sector. "Development will not occur unless developing and developed countries alike open their markets and encourage private investment and entrepreneurship."

    In the area of human rights the document says that no officially recognized human rights abusing nation should sit on the UN Human Rights Commission or any other human rights body.

    The document refers to the family as the "basic unit of society" and says that marriage between a man and women is essential to civilization and especially important to the welfare of children.

    The document also touches on the most controversial topic at the UN, abortion. It notes that maternal mortality has "not decreased since the 1994 Cairo International Conference on Population and Development" which tried to link maternal mortality reduction to broadly defined reproductive rights. Effectively reducing maternal mortality will require "improving basic health care for women, prenatal education and care, basic and emergency obstetric care, and trained birth attendants" according to the document.

    The document also warns against "the misinterpretation of terms like 'reproductive health,' 'reproductive health services,' and 'reproductive rights'' which have often "impeded progress and diverted attention from the goal of reducing maternal mortality and improving basic health care." Such language, it says, has "been used by a UN treaty implementation committee to undermine the values and sovereignty of individual nations. Such language was not in the Millennium Declaration and has no purpose in this document."

    The release of the document took place at an annual conference known as the DPI/NGO Conference. The conference is taking place a week before the 2005 World Summit where negotiations over the MDGs are set to conclude. Some 2,000 NGO are represented at the conference where they are actively engaged in trying to influence those World Summit negotiations.

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