China is furious as Bush halts UN 'abortion' funds

The Sunday Telegraph (U.K.) ^ | 02/03/2002 | Damien McElroy

[Pokey78]

A DECISION by President Bush to suspend £24 million of United States funding to a United Nations body accused of assisting forced abortions in China is threatening to cloud his visit to Beijing this month.

By withholding the money from the UN Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA), Mr Bush has made clear his opposition to China's extreme population control methods. Beijing is hoping to extend the controls, which restrict the majority of couples to one child, for another generation.

Beijing is furious with Mr Bush, who has been swayed by reports implicating the UNFPA in abuses of the one-child policy. China's foreign ministry told The Telegraph that the US had not made the "correct choice".

"The allegations by some American congressmen on the UNFPA's support for China's forced abortion and sterilisation operations is totally groundless," said a spokesman. "Some Americans, acting regardless of the facts, have lobbied for the US to cancel its donation to the UNFPA. This is with ulterior intentions, and is unfavourable for international co-operation in population control."

Allegations about UNFPA collusion with Chinese officials responsible for forcing women to terminate unauthorised pregnancies came late last year from the Population Research Institute (PRI), an American right-to-life research group.

Scott Weinberg, the PRI director of government affairs, conceded, however, that the administration would suffer a backlash from the powerful pro-China lobby if Mr Bush criticised the one-child policy while visiting the country.

"If Bush makes the UNFPA issue into a question of China's one-child policy and into an attempt to reform Communist China, then we lose, because the China lobby is too powerful here," he said. "Bush would never bring up UNFPA publicly, and highly unlikely privately, during such a trip." Conservative members of the US Congress note that the President did not mention the issue on a trip to Shanghai in October. His decision on January 12 to halt UNFPA funding has angered China, however, and is set to inject a sour note into this month's visit, starting on February 21.

The trip has been portrayed by Beijing as marking the 30th anniversary of Richard Nixon's groundbreaking visit to China in 1972.

The PRI has campaigned to persuade Congress that the UN agency is ineligible for US financing because it supports abortion services abroad. US law prohibits grants of federal funds to any organisation involved in providing abortions overseas, and Mr Bush, in one of his first official acts, made clear that he - unlike President Clinton - would respect the restriction.

A PRI researcher, Josephine Guy, recently visited China incognito and claims to have witnessed a forced abortion in a county designated as a model family planning regime by the UNFPA.

Ms Guy gained access to Sihui county's family planning bureau to photograph the local UNFPA desk. At a local hospital later, she interviewed a 19-year-old woman minutes before family planning officials took her behind a curtain to perform a termination. "Would she like to keep her baby?" Ms Guy asked the teenager's friends as she was led away. "Oh, yes," came the reply, "but the law forbids it."

Steve Mosher, the head of the PRI, said the photographs and testimony obtained by Ms Guy proved that the UN body was violating its pledges not to assist abortion programmes. "The UNFPA has repeatedly been caught promoting abortion and sterilisation under circumstances where informed consent is lacking, and even outright coercion is involved," he said.

A report issued by his group included pictures of houses that had been demolished by Chinese family planning officials in retaliation for the occupants' refusal to abide by the one-child policy.

Sarah Craven, of the UNFPA Washington office, said the agency had negotiated with the Chinese for two years to ensure that its county programmes were not tainted by the zealotry or malpractice common in the implementation of the one-child policy.

"Our main goal is to show the Chinese that they can meet demographic goals without resorting to human-rights violations or coercion," she said.

In the drive to stabilise China's population at 1.6 billion by 2050, there have been millions of victims. Besides ordering abortions and sterilisations, family planning officials often grow wealthy from fines levied on people with no chance of legal redress.

[RnMomof7]

Sorry he gave them what they wanted the most "Normal trade relations "status

I am glad that he at least did this..but he should have done both

No roses for this common sense decision

[Deb]

Someone run over to the DU and tell ASKEL5.

[RippleFire]

UN_List: for United Nations articles. 

Other Bump Lists at: Free Republic Bump List Register

Don't forget UN International Conference on Financing
 for Development in Monterrey, March 18-22

[piasa]

Interesting that China thinks it is entitled to US taxpayer dollars ... so it can curb its own population.

[meenie]

This is hogwash! This sum of money out of the favorable trade deficit China has with us wouldn't even pay a month's interest. This is a journalist expressing his desires and using the Chinese as an excuse to criticize Bush and push the abortion position.

[Dales]

Badabump

[monkeywrench]

Why not? They felt entitled to US tax payer funded military info., congressmen, and at lesat one President?

[Khepera]

Lets do more to piss off the Chinese. Lets take away their trade status.

[LibKill]

TS to Beijing.

Forcing an abortion on a woman is beyond barbaric.

[MsLady]

China is furious as Bush halts UN 'abortion' funds

Tough beans!!! We shouldn't be funding abortions anyway. I doubt there are many American's who want there tax dollars to go to forced abortions.

[piasa]

LOL, sad but true. Kind of like feeding a 'gator. Sooner or later he just demands it.

[Boxsford]

Come on RnMomof7, when I first heard this news I immediately thought of you! I was hoping you be just a tad more encouraged. Here's hoping for the best.......

[Green Knight]

Nevermind that they're forcing a woman to have an abortion with American tax dollars.

But hey, if they want to deal with their over-population problem, then I say the U.S. should help them out. And all it'd take to solve their problem is a fistful of nukes...

[SpookBrat]

Beijing is furious with Mr Bush

Waaaaaaaaaa! Sniff...how can we ever recover???

[sweetliberty]

I am glad that Bush did this. Why does ANY country think they're entitled to U.S. money, but especially for something so blatantly wrong?

[SpookBrat]

BUMP!

Can you ping the abortion and prolife list? How do you do that?

[Khepera]

Just put their names in the to: field like this.

[hove]

China is nothing more than a very large third world nation......

[hove]

Taking handouts from a superpower.....

[hove]

Fund your own destruction China. Time to grow up!

[gcraig]

A DECISION by President Bush to suspend £24 million of United States funding to a United Nations body accused of assisting forced abortions in China is threatening to cloud his visit to Beijing this month.

Good! This is my tax $$$. I do not want any of my money going to kill kids anywhere. Thank God for President Bush! He rocks.

[sinkspur]

No roses for this common sense decision

You are one crusty old broad.

[He Rides A White Horse]

Beijing is furious with Mr Bush, who has been swayed by reports implicating the UNFPA in abuses of the one-child policy. China's foreign ministry told The Telegraph that the US had not made the "correct choice".

Dear China:

(laughing at you)

[mustapha mond]

The sound course of action would be to attack the Chi Coms now before they get to strong and take us out. As for the fact that they feel entitled to US taxpayer funds to help them kill more babies, they can collectively kiss my a@@. --MM

[He Rides A White Horse]

I'm wondering where the Chinese as well as feminist groups here think that they are entitled to our money to fund their perverse policies.

......and if people refuse to go along with this, they are 'anti-freedom'.

Let these leeches pound sand.

[hinckley buzzard]

China says the US did not make "the correct choice." Iraq says the US is the terrorist. North Korea threatens to attack if we don't talk nice.

This is one of the more annoying elements of the clinton legacy.

After 8 years of feckless Mad incompetence and Strobie's thinly veiled treason, not to mention the cowardly Billyboy's pusillanimous caving in to tin-pot potentates, every third-world backwater sinkhole of a country thinks they can lecture the United States--and make it stick.

We didn't have a president, we had Rodney Dangerfield in the White house.

[hinckley buzzard]

Probably not many, but I could name a few US Senators from certain coastal states...

[RnMomof7]

You are one crusty old broad.

Why Sink that is about the nicest thing you have ever said to me :>))

[Red Jones]

I'm glad Bush did this, the Chinese officials who are angry are idiots because they are angry over not receiving handouts; but the journalist who wrote this is a dog because he failed to give any hint as to the numbers of people killed due to this policy. There have been 50-60 million girl babies put to death because of this policy. That doesn't count the number of children not born due to this policy. Nobody has a handle on how many forced abortions & sterilizations. These things I've mentioned are well established facts, I don't see why the journalist must obscure them when it is central to the issue.

[TheRedSoxWinThePennant]

I GET GIDDY WHENEVER WE PISS OFF CHINA

[heleny]

DECISION by President Bush to suspend £24 million of United States funding to a United Nations body accused of assisting forced abortions in China

Thank you, President Bush, for standing up to the UN for us!
Even pro-choice Americans would object to our funding of forced, non-negotiable abortions, if only they knew.

Some Americans... have lobbied for the US to cancel its donation to the UNFPA

When the recipients of our donations begin to demand more, as if they were entitled to our money instead of appreciating our generous gifts, we need to evaluate how undeserving of our magnanimity they have become.

How awful that China has the gall to lecture whether our choice of how we spend our money is "correct" or not. This behavior is part of the legacy of the last thirty years of our coddling of them.

[Mfkmmof4]

Bet if we kept that money our surplus would be just fine :)

[JMJ333]

Thank you, God! Lets keep those prayers strong!

[JMJ333]

"Giving credit where it is due" bump. I hope this is only the beginning! =)

[Jmouse007]

Say Communist China, if you want to kill your unborn children;

USE YOUR OWN MONEY!

Dr. S

[Right_in_Virginia]

Why are the taxpayers of America paying for any "social program" in China or anywhere else in the world???? We keep the world's bad guys on the run...shouldn't that be enough?

Having said that...thank you President Bush.

[Mfkmmof4]

Great question and you are so right!!

[EODGUY]

I'm elated GW made the moral decision.:)

[Paulus Invictus]

What! And wreck Wal-Mart ( and several others in bed with the Chicoms)???

[RLJVet]

It is good to p/o the Chinese. This little personal boycott of mine doesn't seem to be doing the trick, though it is no small feat.

And how do you like this?:
US law prohibits grants of federal funds to any organisation involved in providing abortions overseas, and Mr Bush, in one of his first official acts, made clear that he - unlike President Clinton - would respect the restriction.

Could he mean:
. . . he - unlike President Clinton - would respect the law?.

[JMJ333]

I give credit when its deserved and the first to hand out criticism when its warrented. Hopefully we can begin to make some progress. We have to keep holding feet to the fire. =)

[Lurker]

So you support the Chinese government policy of murdering kids?

L

[EODGUY]

That is one of the many reasons your comments are regarded so highly. You are sincere and illustrate that sincerity even to those with whom you don't always agree.

Would that others would follow your lead!

[JMJ333]

FWIW, If this had gone the other way, the replies would already have been 200+. The silence says a lot about agendas. Personally, I'm glad of this decision and think it was worth this bump.

[sinkspur]

FWIW, If this had gone the other way, the replies would already have been 200+. The silence says a lot about agendas.

You're right, of course. I wonder where IM2PHAT4U is? He/she is always nit-picking when Bush does/doesn't do something.

Think he/she'll cut him some slack?

[RLJVet]

It is a very good development. Here's another bump for President Bush.

[CounterCounterCulture]

Bravo, Dubya, bravo!

[Judith Anne]

Thank you so much for this heartening post...I remember the story linked on Drudge some time ago, about the two-year old girl who was killed by village authorities, because her life violated China's one-child policy...

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

By withholding the money from the UN Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA)....

Just what kind of George-Orwellian-Double-Speak is THAT??????????!