Democrats eye restoring funds to U.N. agency

UNITED NATIONS | Congress may have found a way to fund the U.N. Population Fund for the first time in seven years, with many lawmakers anticipating that the next U.S. president may have a different view of an organization accused by conservatives of abetting coerced abortion in the developing world.

The House Appropriations state, foreign operations and related programs subcommittee last week appropriated $60 million for the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) as part of a $600 million package for international family planning and reproductive health for fiscal 2009.

Also last week, the full Senate Appropriations Committee passed a foreign operations bill with a $45 million allocation for the family-planning agency for the same budget year.

The Bush administration has effectively vetoed funding for UNFPA every year since 2001, saying that the U.N. agency, which is active in China, supports the state’s one-child-per-family policy, which entails the use of coerced abortions.

Congressional staffers from both parties said that this year, with most appropriations bills likely to be delayed until after the elections and the January recess, the UNFPA money is likely to be reviewed by Mr. Bush’s successor. Presumptive Democratic nominee Sen. Barack Obama is pro-choice. His Republican counterpart, Sen. John McCain, has campaigned as pro-life.

The U.N. Population Fund, formerly known as the U.N. Fund for Population Activities, works in 150 countries to reduce maternal mortality, provide reproductive-health services and reduce the spread of HIV infection. UNFPA and its local partners also provide information on and access to contraceptives, train birth attendants, address sexual violence and promote gender equality.

Its $605 million budget comes mostly from 182 donor countries, as well as private foundations, charities and contributions to trust funds for specific purposes, such as refugee care.

As in previous years, the proposed 2009 U.S. contributions are carefully earmarked for specific uses, such as safe-motherhood initiatives and reproductive-health services, according to the office of Rep. Nita M. Lowey, the New York Democrat who runs the House subcommittee.

These restrictions are aimed at easing concerns about UNFPA’s activities in China and, to a lesser extent, Vietnam, where coercive government policies also severely limit the number of children a family may have. Officially, UNFPA does not endorse one- or two-child policies, but like all U.N. agencies, it defers to national laws.

A 2002 State Department assessment found that UNFPA programs in China neither condoned nor knowingly supported abortions or sterilization. Nonetheless, U.S. funds have been prohibited for use in China on the theory that money freed up by UNFPA can be used for abortions.

Conservatives and pro-life groups are concerned about the future.

U.S. money should not go to UNFPA because its China program is “partnering with the oppressor, not the oppressed,” says Rep. Christopher H. Smith, New Jersey Republican, a prominent member of Congress’ pro-life caucus.

“UNFPA admits that they train, provide manuals and materials to the family-planning cadres in China,” a country he visited just last month, he said.

Even if the U.N. agency does not educate directly about abortion, he added, its “presence is … a whitewash of the government’s crimes against women.”

“There is no question that China is involved [in forcing abortion], and UNFPA assists,” added Wendy Wright, president of the Washington-based Concerned Women for America. “In the seven years that Washington has not been funding UNFPA, there has been no weakening of China’s laws or enforcement of China’s one-child policy.”

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