Event open to the delegates doing the negotiations on maternal mortality

OTTAWA (CCN)



Three pro-life groups with NGO status at the United Nations are joining forces with the Holy See to hold a March 17 event for UN delegates on “Best Practices for Maternal Health Care in Africa.”

The event, sponsored by the Holy See Permanent Observer to the UN “will discuss ways in which every dollar spent on abortion is a dollar denied to the provision of genuine maternal health care for African women and their children,” according to a joint-statement from the organizers.

It will take place during the two-week long 60th Session on the Commission on the Status of Women, March 14-24 at UN headquarters in New York City. Thousands of people from around the world will attend this event, from representatives of various countries, embassies, and NGOs. The theme of this year’s session is “Women’s empowerment and its link to sustainable development.”

The Holy See, Campaign Life Coalition, REAL Women of Canada, and the world’s oldest pro-life organization, the UK-based Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC) have co-sponsored a panel including Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations Bishop Bernardito C. Auza; Dr. Robert Walley, founder and executive director of MaterCare International; Founder and President of Culture of Life Africa Obianuju Ekeocha; and SPUC international director Maria Madise.

“This is really important,” said REAL Women of Canada national vice president Gwen Landolt. “It’s at the UN itself,” not in one of the adjacent buildings and open only to NGOS.

That means the event will be “open to the delegates” who will be “doing the negotiations on maternal mortality.”

In a joint statement, the organizers refer to WHO statistics indicating “approximately 830 women die every day from preventable causes related to pregnancy and childbirth.”

Ninety-nine per cent take place in the developing world; the majority in Africa, the statement says.

“If the international community is serious about meeting the 2030 agenda goal of reducing maternal and child mortality (SDG Targets 3.1 and 3.2), women in the developing world must be given access to the same basic standard of care that has been available to women in the developed world for decades,” the statement says. “The antithesis of helping mothers and their children is the practice of abortion. “

“Ending the lives of babies before they are born is not infant healthcare,” it says. “Rather than a solution, abortion diverts money and attention from the real needs of women and legalizing and expanding access to abortion will not improve maternal health.”

Campaign Life UN observer Matthew Wojciechowski said the co-sponsors have booked the largest conference room in the UN headquarters, one that seats about 500 people.

The conference will provide “an alternative voice to what people hear at the UN every day,” he said. “The message will be evidence-based and will go completely against rhetoric of UN agencies whose mission is promote sexual reproductive rights, and to control population through abortion.”

Wojciechowski said it was “an honor” to be working with the Holy See, which has “been one of the only voices of reason at the UN.” He noted many African nations are also “fighting against this abortion agenda.”

“The Holy See is that voice that always stands up against any assault on human life and the family, so it’s great to work with them,” he said.

CLC and REAL Women have been part of a prolife coalition at the UN consisting of many prolife NGOS for about 20 years. Wojciechowski credits Saint John Paul II with sending out a challenge to prolife groups to become involved at the UN.