The document highlights the growing importance and expanding activities of ‘anti-gender’ movements, which are said to threaten ‘reproductive and sexual rights,’ including the so-called right to abortion.
- The Special Rapporteur of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe on gender published a report on the situation regarding “reproductive and sexual rights.”
- The document highlights the growing importance and expanding activities of ‘anti-gender’ movements, which are said to threaten ‘reproductive and sexual rights,’ including the so-called right to abortion.
- The rapporteur also devotes considerable attention there to the 2020 ruling of the Polish Constitutional Tribunal, noting that Poland is the only European Union member state, and one of two states participating in the OSCE structures, to have “tightened” regulations on access to abortion in recent history.
- The Special Rapporteur recommends implementing the World Health Organization’s guidelines, which, among other things, call on states to fully decriminalize abortion and to prevent the use of conscientious objection.
- The report advances the false claim that so-called reproductive and sexual rights are grounded in treaties, whereas in fact they have no basis in universally binding international law, unlike the right to life.
The report of the Special Rapporteur
Operating within the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE),– Canadian politician and physician Hedy Madeleine Fry, the Special Representative on Gender Issues published a report about the situation regarding “sexual and reproductive health and rights” in the region.
The document is essentially divided into three parts. In the first of these, the rapporteur discusses issues related to sexual and reproductive health and rights, highlights current threats and presents recommendations for the Member States. Part Two contains a summary of the Special Representative’s activities for 2024-2025. The final part of the report presents data on “gender balance” in the Bureau and Secretariat of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, statistics on women’s participation in statutory meetings of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, election observation missions, and ad hoc committees, as well as information on women’s representation in the national parliaments of OSCE participating States.
What are “reproductive and sexual rights”?
Although the authors of the report do not attempt to define the term “reproductive and sexual health and rights,” it is worth explaining what this concept entails for the purposes of the discussion presented in this publication. “Sexual and reproductive health and rights”, which in official documents of various international organizations and other entities also appears as “sexual and reproductive rights” or “reproductive rights”, is an undefined and broadly understood concept encompassing a set of rights related to human reproduction. In this context, it is especially worth noting that left-liberal circles derive from this concept a right to abortion, which, according to them, is meant to be an integral part of “reproductive and sexual rights.”
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