UNITED NATIONS – Many countries at this week’s U.N. population conference are objecting to the idea of enshrining the right of women to make their own sexual decisions, fearing it would tacitly condone same-sex relationships, the U.N. population chief said.
Gay rights emerged as an incendiary issue at the meeting of the U.N. Commission on Population and Development, where country delegates are reviewing progress made since the adoption of a breakthrough action plan at the 1994 U.N. population conference in Cairo, Babatunde Osotimehin, head of the U.N. Population Fund, said in an interview with The Associated Press.
At the Cairo conference, 179 countries recognized for the first time that women have the right to control their reproductive and sexual health and to choose whether to become pregnant. While the conference broke a taboo on discussing sexuality, it stopped short of recognizing that women have the right to control decisions about when they have sex and when they get married.
Many states are trying to include such language in the final document of this week’s population conference, which ends Friday. But Osotimehin said socially conservative countries are resisting the idea, arguing it would implicitly give people the right to enter in same-sex relationships.
Osotimehin is arguing such an interpretation is wrong. He said establishing the right of women to control their sexuality is crucial to fighting practices such as child marriage.