NEW YORK, Sep 30 (IPS) – Last week, UN member states adopted the Pact of the Future – and its two annexes: the Global Digital Compact and the Declaration for Future Generations. These action-oriented documents aim to counter emerging threats to development and accelerate progress on the 2030 Agenda. Nevertheless, there remains little political priority for reproductive justice on this agenda.
This is despite the continued and growing threats to sexual and reproductive health and rights that these problems expose about 43% of women worldwide, who lack autonomy to make choices about their sexual and reproductive health, putting their lives at risk and their chances to reach their full potential.
Remember that the pact, with more than 56 action points, contains only one provision on sexual and reproductive health. The two appendices are silent on this thematic area. Although the three texts should be considered together, and are therefore all comprehensive, thematic areas such as climate and conflict are amply covered in the three texts – and in some cases repeated.
While the ongoing threats of climate and conflict are indeed critical, the lopsided progress on some goals and the degradation of others will ultimately result in the failure to achieve our collective goals for people and the planet.
Alarmingly, more than thirty countries, all of which have adopted the Pact – and therefore committed to safeguarding reproductive health – have signed the Geneva Consensus Declaration (GCD). This is a regressive anti-abortion statement initiated by anti-gender activist Valerie Huber, former advisor to former US President Donald Trump at the US Department of Health and Human Services, who falsely claimed that there is no international right to abortion.
Even though this right is explicitly provided for in international legal frameworks, including the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW); and the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa – commonly called the Maputo Protocol.
Furthermore, the right to abortion has been established by international human rights mechanisms, including the UN Human Rights Committee, the European Court of Human Rights, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights .
Furthermore, the Geneva Consensus Declaration encourages countries to take refuge under the principle of sovereignty to ‘release’ countries from their obligations under international law.
This ideological position runs counter to the thrust of the Pact of the Future, which aims to renew confidence in multilateralism and promote international cooperation. We already know that subscribing to the realist school of thought has led to some of the world’s worst crises, including the historic major wars and raging wars in Africa, the Middle East, Eastern Europe and beyond.
The Geneva Consensus Declaration, which puts forward this position, is therefore an insult to the progress made in international relations towards peace and development.
Yet a country like Kenya maintains its signature on the Declaration – in violation of its own national laws. The Constitution provides for the right to the highest attainable standard of reproductive health. Furthermore, it contains provisions that guarantee access to safe abortion in certain cases.
This is supported by case law, especially in the judgment Constitutional petition E009 of 2020which strongly affirmed that abortion care is a fundamental right under the Constitution of Kenya and prohibited arbitrary arrest and prosecution of patients and healthcare providers for seeking or offering such services.
Kenya should therefore withdraw its signature from this document as it is contrary to national and international laws and contrary to its foreign policy positions.
While the GCD is not legally binding, it could form the basis for how future standards begin. Valerie Huber has even done this through the Institute for Women’s Health launched a mechanism called Protego to operationalize the Declaration. In addition, he has been involved in campaigns targeting the First Ladies of African countries in an effort to secure their countries’ political commitments to the Declaration.
Then, Chad and Burundi recently signed on top; expand its reach. It must therefore be challenged to prevent this from becoming the main basis for entrenching anti-abortion ideology in international law.
After the Summit of the Future and on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, governments and philanthropic organizations has pledged $350 million in new investments for sexual and reproductive health care. While this is welcome in securing these rights, it does not cover the funding gap in sexual and reproductive health and rights.
This vacuum includes critical funding needs to mitigate the threats from the well-funded and coordinated anti-gender/anti-rights movement that misleadingly weaponizes family values toward the denial of human rights. Moreover, it is crucial that the pledges are translated into actual payments that benefit the intended recipients.
As the pace of negotiations and adoption of the Pact of the Future shifts, countries should withdraw their signatures from this Declaration and align their foreign policy positions with their domestic and international legal obligations.
More so, together with philanthropic organizations, civil society and the private sector through the imPACT coalitions – designed to guide reforms and proposals towards the Future Summit and thereafter the implementation process of the Pact, the damaging impact of the anti-gender/anti-rights movement on advancing the development agenda must be taken into account; and formulate strategies to reduce their footprint. These should include universal withdrawal from the GCD. Until then, women and girls – especially in low- and middle-income countries – will continue to die preventable deaths every year from complications arising from unsafe abortions.
Stephanie Musho is a human rights attorney and Senior New Voices Fellow at the Aspen Institute
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