November 8, 2007
Volume 10, Number 47
    
By Samantha Singson

(NEW YORK — C-FAM) At a meeting at UN headquarters this week, a coalition of NGOs and the governments of Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay hosted the New York launch of a document which seeks to advance homosexual rights at the national and international levels. Boris Dittrich, advocacy director for the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender program at Human Rights Watch and moderator of the event stated that this document was the “Magna Carta for human rights in the areas of sexual orientation and gender identity.”

Called the Yogyakarta Principles, the document lists human rights that already exist in binding international law such as the right to life and freedom from torture, and reinterprets each one to include homosexual rights. Based on the tenet of non-discrimination, the Principles assert that nations are legally bound to change their constitutions and penal codes to incorporate homosexual rights, including rights to same-sex unions and gay adoption. 

According to the Principles, “Sexual orientation is understood to refer to each person’s capacity for profound emotional, affectional [sic] and sexual attraction to, and intimate and sexual relations with, individuals of a different gender or the same gender or more than one gender.”  The document states that “gender identity is understood to refer to each person’s deeply felt internal and individual experience of gender, which may or may not correspond with the sex assigned at birth.”

Panelist Mary Robinson, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and signatory to the Yogyakarta Principles, praised the document for addressing a “deficit in the human rights system” that does not adequately address discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, which she argues are “core human rights issues.”

Though she was not present at the meeting, a letter from current UN High Commissioner on Human Rights Louise Arbour was distributed at the meeting in support of the Yogyakarta Principles. Arbour reiterates her office’s commitment to promoting and protecting sexual orientation and gender identity and states that “Excluding lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex persons from equal protection violates international human rights law as well as the common standards of humanity that define us all.”

Pro-family UN experts note that not a single UN human rights treaty mentions sexual orientation and furthermore, UN member states have repeatedly rejected attempts by Brazil and the EU to pass resolutions promoting broad homosexual rights.

The panelists strongly encouraged government delegations to use the Yogyakarta Principles throughout the UN system and as a guide for all future programs and work. Dittrich praised the government of the Netherlands for already using the Principles to help determine development aid.  To help more countries follow the Netherlands example, the organizers announced that an activist guide on the Yogyakarta Principles would be published in the upcoming weeks.

The event was organized by several prominent homosexual rights groups such as the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC), the International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA) and Human Rights Watch.

We are of course deeply troubled that the Bush Administration has voted to give ILGA and two other international homosexual groups the coveted U.N.-affiliated status. It seems that in recent months, through various pro-homosexual actions, the White House has lost touch with the conservative, pro-family values that helped put George Bush in the Oval Office. We hope this trend doesn’t continue as Mr. Bush could soon be presented with pro-homosexual legislation (ENDA, “Hate Crimes,” repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”) coming out of the Democratic-controlled Congress. –Peter LaBarbera

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The following is from Radical Homosexual Groups Approved by UN with Bush Support, by Bradford Short, published Dec 28, 2006, by Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute:

The U.N. Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) recently granted official [consultative] status to three gay-rights non-governmental organizations (NGOs):

• the Danish National Association for Gays and Lesbians,

• the Lesbian and Gay Federation in Germany (LSVD) and

• the International Lesbian and Gay Federation (ILGA).

ECOSOC granted the consultative status to the gay-rights NGOs despite the fact that the UN Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations recommended against it, and the fact that one of the groups had clear links to pro-pedophilia organizations in the past.

ILGA is probably the most infamous of the groups granted ECOSOC consultative status last week. A “global federation of organizations and individuals seeking to” advance gay rights, ILGA, was repeatedly rejected for official UN status many times in the past several years for its connection to a child-sex group called the the North American Man/Boy Love Association (NAMBLA). NAMBLA is probably the leading pro-pedophilia group in the United States. ILGA is said to have expelled NAMBLA but, according to UN delegations, refused to condemn adult-child sex. ILGA said “these groups had joined ILGA at an earlier stage of ILGA’s development, at a time when ILGA did not have in place administrative procedures to scrutinize the constitutions and policies of groups seeking membership.” This claim, at least until last week, gave UN delegations pause since the name “North American Man Boy Love Association makes it fairly clear the group promotes homosexual sex between men and children.

Another approved group, the Danish National Association for Gays and Lesbians considers itself to be an organization that takes a “conservative” approach to gay-rights advocacy in Denmark. That is, its support for gay “marriage,” for gay adoption, and for laws that would force churches to bless gay unions, all are “conservative” endeavors because in doing these things Danish homosexuals do not “want to change the world,” they “just want to be in it on equal terms.” The Association does understand, however, the concerns of “subversive” Danish homosexuals, who want to prevent the “extensive heterofication of [Danish] society” that they say is happening because gays are pursuing “conservative” ends, such as marriage. In this way does the Association understand itself as a moderate gay-rights group.

LSVD includes member divisions such as “LSVD fresh,” which is supposed to be a support group “for youngsters” who are gay.

Twenty-three nations on the Council voted for the groups’ accreditation, while sixteen voted against it, and ten abstained. Among those voting in favor of the gay-rights groups was the United States, which has recently been voting in favor of groups that advance the homosexual agenda at the UN. One UN permanent representative told the Friday Fax that, “while the Bush Administration has been solid on life issues, it seems irrational to me that they insist on favoring gay groups that clearly seek to undermine marriage and the family.”