WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration has taken action against an international charity in Africa over work it does in China, a step the group says is politically motivated and dangerous for poor African women and girls.
The State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development denied the charges but said Thursday that they had told six African governments to stop giving U.S.-donated contraceptives to the British-based Marie Stopes International family planning organization for distribution to their needy populations.
The move affects Ghana, Malawi, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe and follows a determination by USAID that the organization is a major player in a U.N. program in China that the administration says promotes coerced abortion and sterilization.
"Given these circumstances, USAID made the policy decision to inform governments in these countries that it does not want USAID-funded commodities to be provided to Marie Stopes International," the State Department, which oversees USAID, said in a statement.
The United States does not give any direct assistance to the group but it is a leading family planning health provider and one of several distributors of U.S.-donated "contraceptive commodities" — including condoms and intrauterine devices — in some of Africa's least developed countries.
Under U.S. law, the government must withhold assistance to agencies and groups found to support or participate in management of family planning programs abroad that involve abortion and coerced sterilization.
Marie Stopes International, one of the world's largest family planning organizations, complained bitterly about the step, which it said was "purely political" and "dangerous" because it could result in more abortions, maternal deaths and health problems for poor African women and girls.
"Only the Bush administration could find logic in the idea that they can somehow reduce abortion and promote choice for women in China by causing more abortion and gutting choice for women in Africa," it said. "This senseless decision is likely to have only one clear consequence: the death of African women and girls."
The State Department and USAID denied the charge, noting that the same amount of U.S.-donated contraceptive supplies would be sent to the countries in question and that they "will do everything possible," to make sure the contraceptives are distributed in the same countries by other groups.
"Any assertion that the USAID decision ... will likely increase abortions and maternal deaths is false," they said. "USAID is working with governments in the affected countries to ensure that our commodities reach the women and men who need them."
Since 2002 the Bush administration has refused to release $34 million in annual funding to the U.N. Population Fund because of its activities in China despite protests that the programs do not promote abortion or forced sterilization.
Only Republican administrations have enforced the Reagan-era Kemp-Kasten amendment and it has been a political hot potato in Congress for years, pitting abortion rights advocates against abortion foes. But it has not thus far been an issue in this year's presidential race. |