(LifeSiteNews) — An evangelical group is pushing back against the United Nations’ efforts to pressure Costa Rica to decriminalize abortion, warning that the push is an attack on the Central American nation’s sovereignty.
Last month, U.N. Special Rapporteur on the right to health Tlaleng Mofokeng issued a preliminary report on the state of health care in Costa Rica for the U.N. Human Rights Council’s Special Procedures body of so-called independent experts.
The report noted that abortion “is considered a crime” in Costa Rica, “infringing Article 21 of the Constitution and regulated by the Criminal Code. It is not punished in cases when the life or health of the mother is in danger if the abortion could not be avoided by other means. Doctors who suspect that a woman undertook an abortion have the obligation to report it to the Organization of Judicial Investigation.”
This supposedly violates “key principles of human rights,” specifically the “goal of realizing the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health.”
“Criminal and legal restrictions on abortion are discriminatory in nature, restricting autonomy and interfere with the patient-doctor relationship, impacting access to health services, and information,” Mofokeng said. “This is a form of gendered discrimination. Public morality and religious belief cannot serve as a justification for enactment or enforcement of laws that result in human rights violations. The State should impose a moratorium on the application of criminal laws concerning abortion, including legal duties on medical professionals to report pregnant persons who seek abortions to law enforcement authorities.”
Mofokeng’s final report, which will present “key recommendations” to the Human Rights Council, is slated for June 2024, according to the U.N.
In response, the Costa Rican Evangelical Alliance Federation (FAEC) issued a statement condemning any attempt to force Costa Rica to buckle on the issue, Evangelical Focus reported.
Noting that Article 4 of the American Convention on Human Rights adopted by two dozen Central and South American countries affirms a right to life “from the moment of conception,” FAEC declares life “the most important human right of all,” and “giving in as a country to U.N. pressure would be like accepting abortion as a human right, with all the negative implications that this could entail.”
“These globalist tendencies of the U.N. and other international organisations” would “put an end to the sovereignty of the nation, and go against the life of the most defenseless,” the group warned.
“We firmly believe that the values and principles of the Kingdom of God are above all things, and among those is the supreme value of life,” FAEC declared. “We will continue to protect the gift of life, which we know comes from God, to the last consequences.”
The U.N. has long used “human rights” as a pretext for attempting to oppose its left-wing values on the world, such as an effort backed by the U.S. Biden administration and the European Union to formally recognize abortion as a “human right,” the United Nations Population Fund that promotes abortion and contraception around the globe, work to “reconcile” freedom of religion with recognition of homosexuality and transgenderism, and limiting freedom of speech in the name of policing “hate.”