NEWS & VIEWS
from a CATHOLIC perspective

      ROME (CWNews.com) - Delegates at a UN conference setting up an international criminal court are beginning to turn against radical feminists' attempts to have "enforced pregnancy" and "gender persecution" defined as crimes, according to the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute (CAFHRI) on Friday.

      Since the beginning of the conference last week, the Women's Caucus has pushed delegates to include the two issues as criminal statutes, but resisted requests for an explicit definition of the terms. Delegates have expressed concern that 'enforced pregnancy' ... could make any country's refusal to provide on-demand access to abortion a crime under international law," CAFHRI said in a statement. "Similarly, the term 'gender' ... could be interpreted as criminalizing any national laws or policies that favor heterosexual marriage over homosexual couplings."

      Opposition to the inclusion of the terms has found an unexpected ally in the United States. The US delegation has vigorously argued in favor of a precise definition of every crime to be included in the final treaty. Opponents of the terms point out that the court's Draft Statute explicitly endorses the legal principle that "no person should be convicted of a crime without explicit and specific definition of the elements of that crime."