Amnesty International launches global campaign for unrestricted access to abortion
Amnesty International, an organization founded to defend those imprisoned for political crimes and to fight human rights abuses, launched a new campaign last week dedicated to promoting unrestricted access to abortion.
The global campaign, called “My Body My Rights,” was launched on March 6 in response to what the increasingly pro-abortion and homosexualist lobby group says is the failure of governments around the world to defend "sexual and reproductive rights."
Shetty marked the launch of the campaign by meeting women in rural communities in Nepal, where she said the focus of the two-year campaign will be to "help the next generation realize and claim their sexual and reproductive rights." These include unrestricted access to abortion and contraception, the promotion of homosexuality, and to be able to "decide whether and when to have children" and to "decide what type of family to create."
While Amnesty International continues to claim that countries with laws against abortion are "deeply oppressive" and ignore the safety of women, statistics show that these same countries have much lower maternal mortality rates than those with permissive abortion laws.
The group points to Ireland as an example of just such an "oppressive" regime that has little regard for the health of the woman, highlighting the controversial story about Savita Halappanavar as an example of a woman who allegedly died as a result of being denied an abortion.
Ireland legalized abortion last year. However, the Irish government’s inquiry into the woman's death placed the blame squarely on a "failure of basic care" in treating a bacterial infection caused by a “super-bug” that required specialized antibiotic treatment, and not on her not being given an abortion.
Although abortion was illegal in Ireland until last year, a study by US researchers found that Ireland had a better record on maternal health than Britain, which has de facto abortion on demand, with maternal mortality in the UK double that of Ireland.
Amnesty International also targets El Salvador in their campaign, saying the re-criminalization of abortion in the country is "violence against women and girls."
However, the maternal mortality rate in El Salvador has dropped by half since abortion was recriminalized in 1998.
Not mentioned in the “My Body My Rights” campaign literature is Chile, which has the lowest maternal mortality rate in Latin America and where all abortion is illegal.
Dr. Elard Koch, a noted Chilean epidemiologist, attributes Chile's success to the country's promotion of “safe pregnancy” measures, such as “prenatal detection” and access to professional birth attendants in a hospital setting.
South Africa, on the other hand, which has had one of the most permissive abortion laws in Africa since 1996, saw maternal deaths increase twenty percent from 2005-2007. The International Planned Parenthood Federation has acknowledged that part of this “surge” is “due to complications of abortion,” even though abortion is legal.
In their “My Body My Rights” campaign, Amnesty International is demanding that "governments stop the illegitimate use of criminal law to police sexuality and reproduction, and address discrimination in law and practice that leads to violations of sexual and reproductive rights."
In February a Canadian Member of Parliament accused Amnesty International of supporting the “rights of pimps over victims” after a policy document was leaked showing the group calling for the legalization of prostitution.
In the document, Amnesty International argues that men who trade cash for sexual access to a woman’s body ought to be free from government “interference” because they are simply “exercising personal autonomy.”
Canadian MP Joy Smith condemned the Amnesty International policy saying, “We need to recognize prostitution for what it is. It is inherently harmful to women and girls and therefore must be eliminated. Legalization is the wrong approach.”
“Amnesty International has built its reputation on advocating for victims around the world. Why is AI abandoning victims now? Amnesty International has squandered its moral authority and is losing its way,” Smith stated.
Contact:
Amnesty International
International Secretariat
Peter Benenson House, 1 Easton Street,
London WC1X 0DW, UK
Phone: +44-20-74135500
Fax: +44-20-79561157
Twitter account: @Amnestyonline
Email via website: http://www.amnesty.org/en/contact