Canada

Social liberals Paul Martin, Belinda Stronach and Paul Godfrey announced they will not be running for the leadership of the federal Liberal party. All supported abortion and same-sex “marriage.” Stronach was thought to be interested in the leadership, but party rules that limited spending and fundraising and emphasized party connections were probably prohibitive for the former Magna International executive. Godfrey, a Toronto MP and former (pre-Conrad Black) Financial Post publisher, announced he was a candidate, before exiting the race due to “health concerns” … Saoudat Batoukaeva, a Russian immigrant living in Montreal, was awarded $45,000 compensation for having to give birth to twins after undergoing an incomplete abortion in March 1999. She sought more money, but was found negligible herself in not returning for a follow-up examination in March of that year for a “routine tissue analysis” that hospital staff said would have determined whether the abortion was a “success” … A Manitoba woman was given an 18-month conditional sentence after pleading guilty to infanticide. Selena Stevenson, 28, told court she suffocated her baby moments after he was born and threw him into a dumpster because she didn’t think her live-in boyfriend would believe she was raped … A study by the Canadian Institute for Health Information has found that 47 per cent of residents in long-term care live with daily unrelieved pain, 24 per cent suffer depression and 59 per cent have virtually no social involvement … The Quebec Human Rights Commission has ordered the University of Quebec to provide Muslim students with a place to pray, although it stopped short of requiring them to have a separate facility for Muslims only. Marc-Andre Dowd, interim president of the commission, said: “The secular nature of an institution doesn’t remove its obligation to accommodate students in their religious needs.”

United States

The Florida Supreme Court has upheld a 1997 law which had never come into effect because of a temporary injunction that requires doctors to tell a woman seeking an abortion the age of her unborn child and the health risks of abortion to the mother … Pro-lifers are gathering signatures for a petition to have a district court convene a grand jury, after the Kansas Board of Healing Arts cleared Wichita abortionist George Tiller in the death of 19-year-old Christin A. Gilbert in January 2005. Gilbert, who had Down’s syndrome, died as a result of complications from an abortion committed at 28 weeks … Doctors at the Cooper University Hospital in New Jersey suggest that chemotherapy for pregnant women is safe for the unborn child if carried out after the first trimester. Many doctors recommend pregnant women who develop cancer unergo an abortion … Patricia Anderson, a lawyer for the family of Terri Schiavo-Schindler, has told Florida Baptist Witness that representing the Schindlers and taking up Terri’s cause forced her to reconsider her pro-abortion views. “In many ways, it’s the other end of the abortion debate,” she said of realizing that killing people is not the solution to life’s complications and problems … A report from Jane Brown of the University of North Carolina has found that “the more kids are exposed to sex in media, the earlier they have sex.” Her findings looked not only at television and movies but magazines and music, too. The study also found that an important predictor of early sexual intercourse was the perception that a teen’s peers were having sex … Sally Jacobsen, a professor of language at Northern Kentucky University, has been fired after she directed students to vandalize a pro-life display on campus.

International

Valerie Hudson, a professor at Brigham Young University, says that the surplus in China of 30 million men by 2020, a result of the country’s one-child policy, will lead to an increase in crime in that country, because young single men are more likely to become criminals than married men. “When there are more men than women, social instability and crime increases in a society.” Hudson added: “I don’t think the Chinese government can really tackle the roots of the entrenched son preference until it raises the ceiling on the number of children a couple can have” … Chen Guangcheng, a campaigner against China’s one-child policy, has gone missing after being arrested by authorities in Shandong Province. His family also reports they are being harassed. Guangcheng had been planning a lawsuit against the government over forced abortions and sterilizations … In a letter from the Philippine Foundation for Breast Cancer to the Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer, PFBC president Cristina Santos stated: “We acknowledge the abortion and breast cancer link based on physiologic changes in the breast lobules of a woman who chose to deliberately interrupt her pregnancy.” It becomes the eighth medical organization to acknowledge the link between abortion and breast cancer … More than 100,000 Colombians have marched in Bogata to protest against a case before the country’s Constitutional Court that could legalize abortion … Ludwig Minelli, founder of the Swiss assisted suicide clinic Dignitas, says people who have long-term depression should be able to choose to commit suicide. Brian Iddon, a British MP and chairman of the Care Not Killing Alliance, reacted: “People recover from mental illness – that’s certainly not the time to be making decision about whether to live or die” … The Flemish Socialist Party, a member of the coalition government of Belgium, is arguing for euthanasia to be permitted for those under 18 … The board of Amnesty International U.K. has submitted a resolution supporting “sexual and reproductive rights,” including abortion, for consideration at AI’s 2007 international conference.