Developing Countries Revolt Against EU Gender Agenda in New Trade Agreement

By | November 30, 2023

NEW YORK, December 1 (C-Fam) A new twenty-year agreement between the European Union and 79 African, Caribbean, and Pacific countries is embroiled in controversy as developing world leaders worry the EU is attempting to impose controversial sexual rights.

The agreement conditions EU economic support to certain leftwing social and economic priorities including sexuality education, abortion, homosexual/trans issues and other controversial social policies. UK-based global abortion group International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) lobbied for these issues to be in the new agreement since 2019.

Several countries are now reconsidering whether or not to go ahead with ratification of the Samoa Agreement. Seventy-one countries signed the document last month, but full force of the treaty has not yet occurred and could be in danger.

A legal ruling against the new treaty by the International Islamic Fiqh Academy warns Muslims in the twenty-two member states of the Organization of the Islamic Cooperation that terminology in the treaty on abortion, homosexuality, and sex education is “deceptive and contradictory to the clear teachings of Islam.”

The agreement is a “bait and switch” operation according to Sharon Slater, president of Family Watch International, who has campaigned against the agreement the last two years.

Slater told the Friday Fax, “They have deceptively turned this trade and economic agreement into a human rights, sexual-social engineering treaty, using the force of treaty law to impose the EU’s deviant, sexual and social values on ACP countries.”

The New Partnership Agreement replaces the 2000 Cotonou Agreement that had a narrow focus on development, trade and economic advancement. Attempts in 2010 to integrate controversial “sexual orientation and gender identity” provisions were rejected.

Slater says many countries are reconsidering their position on the agreement including Namibia, Nigeria, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, and Uganda.

The government of Nigeria said that they were not present at the signing and that the agreement was being studied with a “view to ensuring that its provisions do not contravene Nigeria’s domestic legislation.”

The government of Namibia released a ministerial statement that outlined several provisions “not in line with the Namibian Constitution.”

Aside from adopting controversial social and economic policies domestically as a condition to partner with EU countries, the agreement could force African countries and Island states to align their foreign policies with the European Union, including following the EU’s lead at the United Nations.

“The treaty commits countries to support a new global order and international governance with the UN at its core,” said Slater.

Slater explained that both “human right” and “sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights” are designated as essential to the agreement, including their interpretation by European countries.

The agreement incorporates a 20-year review of international “sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights” commitments which mandates all nations to “bring laws and regulations that criminalize or otherwise impinge on sexual and reproductive rights into accord with social justice and sustainable development” including by providing children with “comprehensive sexuality education,” legalizing homosexual relations, prostitution, and abortion.

A Roman Catholic Archbishop from Trinidad and Tabogo strongly criticized the Agreement saying it did not align with the values of the Caribbean people and it was “colonial imposition one more time on small fragile states.”

The provisional application of the Agreement will start on January 1, 2024. Consent by the European Parliament and ratification by state parties—all EU Member States and at least two thirds of the Organization of African, Caribbean, and Pacific States —are necessary for the agreement to come into full force.

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