Italy Fights EU on Gestational Surrogacy

By | 2026

UNITED NATIONS, July 10 (C-Fam) The government of Italy announced that it was launching a global moratorium on surrogacy to protect women and children from exploitation and abuse. This happened at the Human Rights Council in Geneva. The EU bureaucracy wasted no time in opposing the effort.

“Women should never be reduced to instruments of reproduction and children should never be treated as a subject of a transaction,” said Eugenia Roccella, the Italian Minister for Family, Natality, and Equal Opportunities.

Roccella made the announcement during a side event at the Human Rights Council held jointly by Chile, Cameroon, and the Holy See. She called attention to the global character of the multi-billion-dollar surrogacy trade and the need for a coherent and coordinated international response to protect women and children from exploitation.

“Surrogacy arrangements may create conditions that expose women and children to exploitation, coercion, trafficking and other serious human rights concerns. When such conditions exist, the international community cannot simply look away,” Roccella emphasized. Italy criminally banned surrogacy in 2004 and in 2024 extended criminal sanctions against anyone attempting to have a surrogacy arrangement recognized in Italy.

While recognizing the “legitimate desire to have a child”, Archbishop Ettore Balestrero, Apostolic Nuncio to the United Nations in Geneva, said that “Every child has the right to an origin that is fully human.” He said that surrogacy violates the rights of the child and distorts the “original relational calling of the family.”

Philipe Kipreos Palao, director of human rights at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Chile, said the moratorium proposal was a “prudent and responsible measure aimed at preventing further harm while allowing for the development of stronger safeguards and coordinated legal responses.”

Salomon Eheth, the UN Ambassador of Cameroon, also emphasized how his country’s laws punish surrogacy with criminal sanctions. “Neither the body of a woman nor the life of a child should become the object of a contractual arrangement of commercial transaction.”

Responding to those who defend surrogacy on altruistic or voluntary grounds, Professor Ursula Basset, an adviser at the National Directorate for International Affairs of Argentina’s Ministry of Justice, said, “I will believe in surrogate motherhood when a rich woman gestates for a poor one.”

The call for a moratorium on surrogacy follows the recommendations in a report by Reem Al-Salem, the UN Special Rapporteur on Women. Her latest report calls on countries to protect mothers from violence. She specifically asked for countries to protect mother-specific language based on biology to ensure protections for mothers, repeating her signature phrase, “you cannot protect what you cannot define.”

Al-Salem and supporters of the moratorium faced immediate blowback from the European Union during an official meeting of the council, only a few minutes after the side event. Ireland, speaking on behalf of 26 of the 27 EU member states, said that “international human rights law does not define motherhood.” They accused Al-Salem of contributing to violence against women. “Narrowing who qualifies as a mother risks erasing diverse realities and reinforces gender stereotypes that contribute to discrimination and violence.”

Italy’s representative disagreed with the other 26 members of the European Union. “Italy believes that supporting motherhood is essential to women’s freedom and dignity. Only then can every woman be truly free to decide whether and when to have children,” she said, and thanked Al-Salem for her work on surrogacy and motherhood.

Italy’s declaration of a moratorium on surrogacy has yet to be made public.

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