ECLJ Makes Its Presence Felt at the United Nations' Biejing +10 Conference

March 05, 2005

(New York, New York)-- ECLJ representative Roger Kiska attended the United Nations' Beijing +10 conference under the accreditation of a Christian NGO, which through the issuance of primary and secondary NGO U.N. passes, allowed ECLJ access to all events including the High Plenary Sessions and all panel discussions.

The United Nations Economic and Social Committee, in New York City in 1995, convened a conference regarding the rights of women, the girl-child, gender mainstreaming and reproductive rights known as the Beijing Conference. The product of that conference was a 20 year framework for action known as the Beijing Platform for Action, which was to be revisited every 5 years to assess where countries stood in implementing the platform.

In 2000, at the first such reassessment of the Platform, the U.S. delegates under the Clinton administration, and the EU delegates took a very aggressive approach in attempting to redefine gender and reproductive rights, as including an internationally recognized right to abortion. It is well documented in journals and political newspapers, as well as in first hand accounts from former delegates, that many smaller nations in Central and South America, Africa and the EU candidate countries at the time were threatened with pulling of aid money or expulsion from the EU candidacy process if they did not reach a suitable agreement on the language to the satisfaction of the EU and the United States.

The centre of controversy at Beijing +5 became the definition of gender. This had become especially contentious because of a mandate in the platform for gender mainstreaming programs in all participating nations which included in many such nations the establishment of gender sensitivity and/or promotion agencies within the governments of these respective States. With these smaller nations holding their ground in the debates, including Slovakia which at the time was led by Anna Zaborska (now MEP and chairperson of the Women's Committee for the European Parliament) and Dr. Eva Grey, the liberal language defining gender as proposed by the EU and the United States was voted down in favor of language defining gender as: "the word "gender" had been commonly used and understood in its ordinary, generally accepted usage in numerous other United Nations forums and conferences; (2) there was no indication that any new meaning or connotation of the term, different from accepted prior usage, was intended in the Platform for Action."

This definition was added to the Platform as annex four and included countless reservations from participating nations. However, in the written platform published by the United Nations, Annex 4 is not included. Further, in pursuance of the gender mainstreaming program, the United Nations agencies have all but unanimously defined gender using the voted down language of social construct. These agencies include: The United Nations Population Fund, the World Health Organization, and the Office of the Special Advisor on Gender Issues and Advancement of Women (OSAGI).

(a) ECLJ and Slovakia's Delegation:

ECLJ worked with the Slovak delegation, past and current delegates from all three conferences, in supporting the American Amendment to the Beijing Platform which stated that nothing in the Beijing Platform for Action created new international human rights and no right to abortion was created. ECLJ also met with the Slovak delegates to provide research on the gender definition in furtherance of the goal of bringing to debate in the High Plenary the issue of why the United Nations was using language defining gender which was specifically voted down at Beijing +5. The work with the Slovak delegates gave ECLJ access to the private delegate areas which were not accessible to other NGO's or lobbyists.

(b) ECLJ and C-FAM:

ECLJ also participated in meetings with C-FAM regarding how to best lobby the American amendment to the Platform which fought to put wording in the Platform which stated that abortion was not a right. ECLJ provided the lobbyists with information on how to best lobby the Eastern European delegates and provided a status report on where Slovakia stood.

(c) ECLJ and the Catholic Social Scientist NGO

ECLJ also worked closely with the Catholic Social Scientist NGO in its efforts to have all events and side events participated in and all major happenings reported for future reference. In pursuance of this, ECLJ attended and wrote notes at designated conference events. The Catholic Social Scientists includes such notable legal scholars as Harvard's Mary Anne Glendon and Notre Dame's Edward Bradley and Charlie Rice (who also co-founded the International Centre for Law and Justice with Patrick Monaghan).