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Procedure is Flagrantly Ignored at the Commission on the Status of Women

New York City, New York — Circumventing decades of procedure and ignoring weeks of debate, both the Kenyan ambassador, acting as facilitator, and the Irish ambassador, acting as chair, claimed consensus where none was to be found and openly moved forward with a radical agenda at this year’s session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW). This action reduces the safeguards enjoyed by Member States and degrades the credibility of the UN.

“It is clear that the UN is being overtaken by those promoting radical agendas by stifling debate from individuals and nations who support family and life,” said FWI president Sharon Slater. “We are used to underhanded and duplicitous tactics to promote aggressively progressive agendas, but to have such a blatant disregard for UN procedure—effectively muzzling the concerns of dozens of participating nations—is unheard of at the United Nations.”

For weeks, nations repeatedly and strongly contested multiple provisions that promoted abortion, gender/transgender confusion, comprehensive sexuality education, and radical sexual rights. “The facilitator completely ignored calls for deleting certain sections of language and included almost every controversial paragraph, all while pretending the working document represented the consensus of the group, which it clearly didn’t,” says Slater. The facilitator also abruptly deleted a paragraph calling for recognizing and respecting national sovereignty and religious and cultural values without discussion.

Following the expression of well-founded and properly-presented criticism expressed by member nations, the CSW Chair announced that the working document had been agreed to with consensus—resulting in statements from 19 Member States decrying the action and formally withholding their consensus from the document. Most concerning to the Member States was that there was no consensus on:

• Multiple references to sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights 
• Promotion of sexual rights and related issues that have never garnered consensus
• Refusal to recognize parental rights language
• Refusal to recognize the family as the natural and fundamental unit of society
• Failure to fully reflect the role of the family in protecting women and girls
• Promotion of sexuality education for children, despite its relevance to the theme
• Focus on ambiguous terms such as multiple and intersecting discrimination
• Lack of language on national sovereignty
• Lack of balance when addressing the issue of violence
• Overall issues of transparency and failure to give sufficient time to controversial issues

These actions took place on the heels of deceitful actions at the United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC), where the South African delegation attempted to slide in resolution language that would change the functional definition of women to include men identifying as women throughout UN documents. Thankfully, this duplicity was caught early enough that more than one-third of HRC members have disassociated from the resolution.

“In each session at the United Nations I notice an ever-growing pressure for Member States to ignore traditional family values and the sanctity of life in the pursuit of progressive policies. This not only ignores the legitimate concerns of the conservative individuals and nations, but also harms women and children—classes of individuals that the UN, specifically the Commission for the Status of Women, are charged to protect,” says Slater.

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Family Watch is a U.S.-based non-religious, non-profit organization that promotes family-based solutions to world problems, and the essential role of the family in helping nations achieve sustainable development. Family Watch works at the United Nations (with consultative status) and in countries around the world to promote and strengthen the family as the fundamental unit of society. With members in over 170 countries representing diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds, Family Watch works closely with government, religious, and community leaders, and responsible citizens worldwide to protect traditional marriage, life, parental rights, religious freedom, and the health and innocence of children. For additional information, visit: FamilyWatch.org

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