Philippines and Others Pressured to Accept Abortion and Same-Sex Marriage at UN Human Rights Review

By | November 25, 2022

GENEVA, November 25 (C-Fam) A small but vocal group of nations pressured fourteen of their fellow countries on controversial social issues as the fourth cycle of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) began in Geneva over the last two weeks.

The Philippines was among those reviewed, and the majority-Catholic country’s representatives pushed back on calls to legalize gay marriage and liberalize its abortion laws.  “That’s not acceptable for us,” said the Filipino delegate. “They really want a lot to be implemented here.”

Less than five percent of over four thousand recommendations given explicitly mentioned abortion or issues related to homosexuality or transgenderism.  These topics do not carry international human rights obligations, as they are not mentioned in any binding UN human rights treaty and do not enjoy consensus in the General Assembly.

Nevertheless, several governments continue to bring them up in the hopes of creating new norms through the process known as customary international law.  This is where a generally-recognized norm arises—and is not contested—independent of existing treaty obligations.

The UPR is distinct from other UN human rights mechanisms because instead of experts speaking to nations, UN member states are speaking to each other.  Over several years, each UN member country takes its turn to receive recommendations on how it might improve its human rights record.  Each recommendation is individually “supported” or “noted.”

During its review, Tunisia “noted” fifteen calls to decriminalize homosexual behavior and one request to decriminalize abortion.  While some recommendations received immediate responses, most will be answered in the coming months.

In the third cycle of the UPR, which began in 2017 and ended in January, over 46,000 recommendations were exchanged between nations.  Only about 1800, or under four percent, related to sexual orientation and gender identity, while 226 contained explicit pressure on abortion.  Recommendations on these topics were about half as likely to be marked as “supported” as recommendations on other topics.

This pressure mostly comes from developed countries, especially in Western Europe and North America, and is directed toward developing countries in the global South.  However, countries with liberal abortion laws and widespread acceptance of LGBT rights are pushed to go further.

In the UK, transgender activists have been campaigning to legally change their gender on the basis of self-identification alone.  Efforts to change the law in 2020 were rejected due to widespread opposition.  At the UPR, the Netherlands, Iceland, and Malta urged the UK to enact the controversial “self-ID.”

Similar recommendations went to the Netherlands, Ecuador, and Finland. During Finland’s review, Argentina, Canada, Iceland, and Spain made recommendations in favor of legal “gender affirmation” for minors under 18.

During the third cycle of the UPR, Iceland was particularly aggressive, accounting for over twenty-one percent of all abortion-related pressure and over ten percent of pressure related to sexual orientation and gender identity.  As the fourth cycle begins, Iceland continues to prioritize these issues in Geneva.  Meanwhile, Denmark and the Netherlands fund a coalition called the “Sexual Rights Initiative” which helps generate civil society submissions to the UPR in the hopes of generating more recommendations on these controversial issues from like-minded countries.

Nevertheless, the UPR provides evidence that these issues remain highly contested. Most countries do not make recommendations on these issues and there remains a low level of “support” for them when received.

Share on Facebook
Share on Twitter