The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) Strategic Plan includes promotion of abortion

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Demands of radical ideological circles are gaining support in the United Nations. The Executive Board of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) decided to amend the Strategic Plan for the years 2018–2021 by incorporating the assumptions concerning, e.g., the promotion of abortion on a broad scale and the acceptance of the provisions of the controversial Nairobi Summit held in November 2019. Moreover, the UNFPA declared that it would create a body monitoring the implementation of the decisions of this conference which were adopted in an unauthorised manner. During the Nairobi Summit, the broadening of access to abortion and the granting of privileges to persons identifying with the LBGT movement were postulated.

During a virtual meeting of the Executive Board, the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) adopted changes in the UNFPA’s strategic plan for the years 2018–2021. The Strategic Plan was expanded with a pro-abortion document entitled the Nairobi Statement. It contains paragraphs concerning ‘access to abortion to the full extent of the law’ as a part of ‘the right to sexual and reproductive health services in humanitarian and fragile contexts’. Paragraph 12 of the Nairobi Statement postulates ‘access to safe abortion services’ in urgent ‘humanitarian’ contexts. The document also expands the definition of ‘sexual and reproductive health’ to include homosexual and transgender rights as requested by the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute and the Lancet medical journal.

The document adopted during the last UNFPA session stated in paragraph 17: “… Global consultations led to the adoption of the Nairobi Statement, which provides a framework for government and partner commitments to ensure the accelerated implementation of the ICPD Programme of Action”. However, no consultations or negotiations took place during the Nairobi Summit, the final document was not adopted by consensus, and states had no possibility of holding a debate on it. For these reasons, the governments of many states, including the United States, Brazil and Poland, expressly objected to decisions imposed by the UN, as well as the method in which this event had been held. In consideration of the character of the summit and the resistance of many countries towards the contents approved at that time, the statement contained in the document adopted by the UNFPA can raise even stronger doubts. According to this statement, the UNFPA intends to create a high-level commission that would monitor the implementation of commitments assumed at the Nairobi Summit and, in co-operation with partners, elaborate a transparent mechanism for the monitoring of their implementation.

 The latest decisions of the UNFPA, as well as those adopted during the Nairobi Summit, are inconsistent with valid international law. Paragraph 8.25 of the Programme of Action of the International Conference in Cairo in 1994 indicates that abortion can never be promoted as a family planning method, and governments are obliged to reduce the recourse to abortion. Referring to the final document of the Nairobi Conference in November 2019 by the UNFPA goes beyond the arrangements of the international community.

“First of all, the organisers stressed that the Nairobi Summit was an unofficial UN event and all decisions were non-binding arrangements. Not only the content of its conclusions, which aroused opposition in many member states, but also the very manner of its organisation was highly questionable. In spite of declarations on the open character of the event, the organisers prevented almost all organisations acting in defence of life and family from registering for the Summit. The final document was not preceded by negotiations between national delegates – it was imposed from above by the UNFPA. Moreover, the Nairobi Summit Statement was not negotiated or supported by the UN General Assembly,” notes Anna Jackowska, an analyst at the Ordo Iuris International Law Centre.