For Immediate Release:	July 23, 2002
For More Information:	Tony Kerridge, Marie Stopes International, 020 7574 7416 Diane Thomas, Marie Stopes International, Diana.Thomas@stopes.org.uk, +020 7574 7416 or +077 71681 265
Sponsor Organization:	Marie Stopes International
"As is always the case in situations of this kind, it is the innocent that suffer the consequences of such arbitrary and ill informed reasoning" -- Patricia Hindmarsh
Global sexual and reproductive health agency, Marie Stopes International, today strongly condemned the White House decision late last night to deny the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) the millions of dollars it has been withholding over charges that it supports coercive abortion and sterilisation of women in China. "This absurd decision ranks alongside other dark chapters in American history, such as the McCarthy hearings and the Salem witch trials, where individuals were condemned out of hand on the strength of uncorroborated, unsubstantiated and, frankly, malicious 'evidence'," said Patricia Hindmarsh, MSI’s Director of External Relations. "As is always the case in situations of this kind, it is the innocent that suffer the consequences of such arbitrary and ill informed reasoning; in this instance, thousands of the world's poorest women, whose sexual and reproductive health, and even lives, may be put at risk by the decision to defund the UNFPA." The source of this decision was an unsubstantiated claim by a far-right US anti-family planning group, the Population Research Institute, which earlier this year alledged that the organisation was complying with China’s coercive one-child policy. President George W. Bush froze the $34 million Congress had allocated the UNFPA until this claim could be investigated. The charges have since been disproved by various investigators, including a delegation of British MPs and, it is reported, President Bush’s own State Department team which visited China in May. President Bush has chosen to acknowledge the slur on the UNFPA, however, despite all the evidence to the contrary, purely to maintain the support of the US fundamentalist right. Prior to this Administration, the US government had been the largest bilateral supporter of reproductive health and population programmes. Its support of the UNFPA has helped the organisation to provide reproductive services (not abortion) to millions of women in 142 countries. By singling out China's policies as a reason to cut all assistance to UNFPA, the US is now victimising these same women and their families who have become dependent on UNFPA-supported programmes. “Reproductive health remains central to women's opportunities and choices in life,” said Ms Hindmarsh. “Smaller and healthier families, fewer sexually transmitted infections and safer childbirth are major benefits, yet more than 350 million women still do not have access to a choice of safe and affordable contraceptive methods.” Around 600,000 women die each year from mostly preventable causes related to pregnancy and millions more suffer injury or infection. “They are among the poorest and most vulnerable women in the world and the US Administration’s denial of vital financial support for programmes that can help save these women is both inhuman and cruel.”