* MOZAMBIQUE MOVES TOWARDS LEGALIZING ABORTION - Policymakers in the Southern African country of Mozambique are pushing to make the country one of the few African nations to legalize abortion on demand.
The push for the change in law is coming from the Mozambique Health Ministry, which claims that legalizing abortion will cut down on the number of women who die as a consequence of illegal abortions.
According to an IRIN report, health services in Mozambique estimate that in the 1990s 11% of maternal fatalities in the capital of Maputo were a consequence of botched abortions. It is also estimated that 40% of all serious pregnancy complications are related to illegal abortions.
"You cannot imagine the means people use for unsafe abortions," said Graca Samo, the executive director of the Women's Forum, a feminist organization that is pushing for the legalization of abortion in Mozambique. "It can be a pen, a piece of wood. It can be whatever it is."
Pro-life advocates, however, have long ago learned to take numbers of maternal deaths and "serious complications" as a result of "unsafe" illegal abortion with a large pinch of salt. Prominent U.S. abortionist Dr. Bernard Nathanson admitted shortly after leaving his career as an abortion doctor that he and his abortion co-conspirators used to create hugely inflated statistics about maternal deaths caused by illegal abortions to soften the public to accept abortion on demand. Since then, he said, the use of grossly inflated numbers of illegal abortions and deaths of mothers from those abortions, has been a tactic abortion activists around the world have used to change laws.
"Repeating the big lie often enough convinces the public," said Nathanson. "The number of women dying from illegal abortions was around 200-250 annually. The figure we constantly fed to the media was 10,000. These false figures took root in the consciousness of Americans, convincing many that we needed to crack the abortion law."
Although it is the local Mozambican Health Ministry that is ostensibly pushing for the change in law, the push for abortion on demand has actually come from a much higher source. Mozambique is one of the African countries that signed on to the so-called Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa, also known as the Maputo Protocol. The protocol, which was signed by a large number of the 53-member states of the African Union, calls for the legalization of "safe" abortion across Africa. (30 May 2007, LifesSiteNews) (to index)

* PROLIFE NURSE GETS REFERRED TO LABOUR COURT - The nurse who has become the national face of opposition to perform abortions must still wait to hear her fate. On Friday, Sister Wilhelmien Charles's R50 000 lawsuit against Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang and Kopanong Hospital in Vereeniging, for the impairment of her dignity, was heard by the Labour Appeals Court in Braamfontein.

For almost three years, Charles has waited to hear whether she would be allowed to refuse to perform abortions. But presiding Judge Dennis Davis referred her case to the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration. However, the judge said that if Charles's matter couldn't be resolved by the CCMA, she was welcome to return to court. (23 June 2007, IOL) (to index)

* "ABSTINENCE BRINGS DIGNITY", MRS BUSH - First lady Laura Bush promoted the role of faith-based organizations in combating disease in Africa as she launched an anti-malaria campaign in Zambia on Thursday.
"Religious institutions bring a personal healing touch to the fight against AIDS,"
Mrs Bush said, adding that Zambian health caregivers "know very well the healing power of faith." She spoke at an event at a community center on the eastern outskirts of Zambia's capital, where she took part in a round-table discussion with local Zambian women and girls who are providing care to family and friends infected with HIV. Mrs. Bush, along with her daughter, Jenna, arrived in Zambia late Wednesday from Mozambique, where she announced a new $507 million aid package. She will travel Friday to Mali, the last stop in a four-nation tour of African countries that have benefited from U.S. AIDS funding. The first lady is using her trip to support the role of faith-based organizations in foreign aid efforts. She planned to visit two such efforts in Zambia, where the vast majority of people are churchgoing Christians. Mark Dybul, the U.S. global AIDS coordinator who accompanied Mrs Bush on her trip, said 40-50 percent of health care in Africa was provided by faith-based organizations. Canisius Banda, a spokesman for the Ministry of Health, said Zambia placed "great importance on the role of faith-based organizations in ... the fight against HIV and AIDS." (28 June 2007, Washington Post) (to index)

International

* ALCOHOL AND PORN BANNED IN ABORIGINAL AREA
* OBJECTION TO UNMARRIED CATHOLIC COUPLES
* EUROPEAN HUMAN RIGHTS GROUP CALLS OFF CREATIONIST VOTE
* CANADIAN ANGLICAN CHURCH REJECTS GAY MARRIAGE

* ALCOHOL AND PORN BANNED IN ABORIGINAL AREA - Australia is to ban alcohol and pornography in Aboriginal areas in the Northern Territory in a bid to curb child sex abuse. All Aboriginal children in the territory will be medically examined.
The new proposals follow a report last week which found evidence of abuse in each of the territory's 45 communities. The report blamed high levels of alcohol and poverty for the situation, which Prime Minister John Howard has described as a national emergency. "We're dealing with a group of young Australians for whom the concept of childhood innocence has never been present," John Howard told parliament. "That is a sad and tragic event. Exceptional measures are required to deal with an exceptionally tragic situation." Mr Howard said the federal government would take over the administration of Aboriginal communities for the next five years so that the new laws would be strictly enforced. For the last decade, Aboriginal communities have by and large been allowed to govern themselves. Aboriginal leaders have expressed outrage at the new measures. (21 June 2007, BBC) (to index)

* OBJECTION TO UNMARRIED CATHOLIC COUPLES - The Omaha Archdiocese of the RCC has severed ties with a Jesuit university's family center after two researchers urged the church to allow unmarried couples to live together and have sex and children as long as they are engaged. The Creighton University researchers' essay, published in the June issue of U.S. Catholic magazine, said that more unmarried Catholic couples are living together today, and that they doubt the claim that the couples are living in sin. "It would appear closer to the truth that they are growing, perhaps slowly but nonetheless surely, into grace," Michael Lawler and Gail Risch wrote. The essay prompted a letter to the editor from Omaha Archbishop Elden Curtiss. The June 5 letter, a copy of which was provided to The Associated Press by the archdiocese, aimed to discredit the researchers as Catholic theologians and dissociated the university's Center for Marriage and Family from the archdiocese. (28 June 2007, AP) (to index)

* EUROPEAN HUMAN RIGHTS GROUP CALLS OFF CREATIONIST VOTE - Europe's main human rights body on Monday cancelled a scheduled vote on banning creationist and intelligent design views from school science classes, saying the proposed resolution was one-sided. The resolution, which the Council of Europe's Parliamentary Assembly was due to vote on Tuesday, said attacks on the theory of evolution were rooted "in forms of religious extremism" and amounted to a dangerous attack on scientific knowledge. Believers in creationism or intelligent design argue that some life forms are too complex to have evolved in accordance with Charles Darwin's theory. Some conservative groups in the United States, both religious and secular, have long opposed the teaching of Darwinian evolution in public schools but U.S. courts have regularly barred them from teaching religious views of creation. Deputies said the motion by the Christian Democratic group of parliamentarians also won support from east European deputies, who recalled that Darwinian evolution was a favorite theory of their former communist rulers. (25 June 2007, Reuters) (to index)

* CANADIAN ANGLICAN CHURCH REJECTS GAY MARRIAGE - The Anglican Church of Canada has decided against offering blessing ceremonies to same-sex couples. A proposal to allow blessings dominated the Church's General Synod meeting in the city of Winnipeg. Opponents said the Church should not endorse homosexuality, while supporters urged it to break from tradition. But while this may ease tensions in the wider Anglican community, it is not clear if it settles the issue in Canada, where gay marriage is already legal. After two days of debate, bishops at the meeting narrowly defeated the proposal by the narrowest of margins. Three groups each needed to give separate approval. A majority of clergy and lay Anglicans voted in favour of gay blessings. But bishops at the meeting voted by just two votes against the motion and without their support, the proposal failed. The newly-elected head of the Anglican Church of Canada says the outcome is disappointing for everyone. Bishop Fred Hiltz says the vote was so very close that few Anglicans on either side of the debate will take much comfort in it. The results suggest that Anglicans in Canada generally support the idea of their churches offering same-sex blessings. And, according to one bishop, the crucial "no" vote by bishops did not mean "no", so much as "not now" because beyond any religious objections to gay blessings, the Anglican leadership are acutely aware that moves in Canada and the US to liberalise Church views on homosexuality have threatened to split the international Anglican family. (25 June 2007, BBC) (to index)