The United Nations was forced to water down a resolution on combating rape in conflict-torn nations after the Trump administration threatened to veto the measure over language referring to reproductive health.
The United Nations Security Council approved the resolution Tuesday after the United States fought for language referring to reproductive health care for rape survivors to be removed. The security council was also forced to withdraw the creation of a new monitoring body to report atrocities because of opposition by the United States, Russia, and China, The Guardian reported.
The United States threatened to veto the resolution entirely over language referring to “sexual and reproductive health.”
The resolution included a clause that “urges United Nations entities and donors to provide non-discriminatory and comprehensive health services, including sexual and reproductive health, psychosocial, legal and livelihood support and other multi-sectoral services for survivors of sexual violence, taking into account the specific needs of persons with disabilities,” The Guardian reported.
UN officials fought the move. Primila Patten, the UN special representative on sexual violence in conflict, told The Guardian Monday that it would be a “huge contradiction that you are talking about a survivor-centered approach and you do not have language on sexual and reproductive healthcare services, which is for me the most critical.
But the Trump administration won out, leaving European allies furious.
“We deeply regret the language on services for survivors of sexual violence, recognizing the acute need for those services to include comprehensive reproductive and separate sexual healthcare,” Tariq Ahmad, the United Kingdom’s special representative on preventing sexual violence in conflict, told The Guardian. “If we are to have a survivor-centred approach, we cannot ignore this important priority.”
French permanent representative to the UN Francois Delattre said the country was “dismayed by the fact that one state has demanded the removal of the reference to sexual and reproductive health … going against 25 years of gains for women’s rights in situations of armed conflict.”
The move to strip the reproductive health language from the resolution came after similar previous attempts failed. The administration failed in its attempt to remove language referring to sexual and reproductive health from multiple resolutions before the General Assembly, The Independent reported. The Trump administration is also seeking to eliminate the word “gender” from UN human rights documents, according to The Guardian.
The attempts to weaken the resolution by the United States, Russia, and China had been a point of concern for advocacy group’s before the Trump administration’s veto threat. Last month, 10 NGOs said in a statement that it was a dangerous to adopt such a “weak resolution” given the “further hardening of antidemocratic and decidedly misogynistic stances in the UN security council.”
“Some powerful members of the security council, such as Russia, China and the USA, are undermining women’s rights and once again questioning, for example, women’s and girls’ right to self-determination,” the statement said. “Through such actions, the achievements that have already been made could be shattered and the ‘women, peace and security’ agenda overall decisively weakened.”
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment. We are presently looking for 500 new monthly donors in the next 10 days.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy