UN Human Rights Committee formally excludes unborn child from ‘right to life’

Nov 4, 2017 by Jill

By Stefano Gennarini, J.D., C-Fam:

Despite pleas from more than one hundred governments and pro-life organizations, including the United States and Poland, the UN Human Rights Committee excluded unborn children from the right to life in international law this week in Geneva.

“I was worried for a minute we would discuss the word limit for separate opinions,” joked Yuval Shany. The Israeli law professor was mocking pro-life concerns as the committee rushed through a second reading of a controversial draft commentary on the right to life in a what is perhaps the most important UN human rights treaty.

Shany, who has been in charge of the draft for two years, knew there would be no dissent. The 18 members of the committee that records state efforts to implement the UN treaty on civil and political rights unanimously agreed on a text that in some respects is more extreme than previous ones.

The committee added language about access to abortion not just being a right under the covenant, but that it must also be “affordable” and “effective,” as abortion groups recommended to the committee. U.S. law professor Sarah Cleveland said this was needed to make it easier for rape victims to obtain abortions.

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