Created in the wake of World War II, the United Nations has veered far from its intended reason for existence to mediate disputes and foster international co-operation to become a large, overbearing global entity that violates national sovereignty by promoting a radical, socially activist agenda. No longer primarily worried about mediating international disputes, it has engaged in attempts to make policy for all nations through a series of documents and conventions that, quite frankly, it has no business or mandate doing.
The laundry list of conferences – the Cairo International Conference on Population and Development the Beijing Conference on Women, the Convention on the Rights of the Child – and various agencies – the Population Fund, the Con-vention on the Elimination of Discrimin-ation Against Women, UNICEF – consistently feature aspects of the international anti-life, anti-family agenda. This includes declaring abortion a universal human right and children’s access to contraception as an urgent necessity (both dressed up as “reproductive health services”) and the promotion of homosexuality and other radical causes.
Were it not for the hard work of a coalition of traditionally minded nations and a coterie of supporting pro-life, pro-family non-governmental organizations (including the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children in the United Kingdom, the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute in the U.S., and REAL Women and Campaign Life Coalition in Canada), the radical agenda would have been imposed on all countries. Most recently, the success of pro-life, pro-family delegates and NGOs ensured the working document for the now postponed 10-year review of Convention on the Rights of the Child did not include abortion rights for girls as young as 10 years old. The importance of parents in directing the lives of children was, in fact, recognized.
Aside from its immoral agenda, the UN’s second great failure is one of accountability to member states and member states to their people, and the loss of sovereignty. It is wrong to cede the power to regulate abortion – or any other issue, for that matter – to a collection of unelected delegates that work outside the normal democratic framework and with a minimum (to put it charitably) of accountability. To make matters worse, in many countries, including Canada, there is no public or parliamentary debate when we do accede to the provisions of conventions, conferences and documents of the UN. At the very least, we have a right as Canadians to demand such a debate and for the vote in Parliament to represent the views of the country and not a limited number of special interests who often compose the official delegations.
