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 "The United States is disappointed by and categorically rejects this
transparent attempt to take advantage of the COVID-19 pandemic to
assert the existence of such a right," the U.S. mission in Geneva
said in a release posted on Twitter.
"This is a perversion of the human rights system and the founding
principles of the United Nations," it said, citing an Aug. 11 letter
it sent to the U.N. experts responding to the "spurious
allegations".
The U.N. working group on discrimination against women and girls
said on May 27 that some U.S. states "appear to be "manipulating the
COVID-19 crisis to curb access to essential abortion care".
The panel of five independent U.N. experts said that states
including Texas, Oklahoma, Alabama, Iowa, Ohio, Arkansas, Louisiana
and Tennessee had issued COVID-19 emergency orders suspending
procedures not deemed immediately medically necessary to restrict
access to abortion.
"This situation is also the latest example illustrating a pattern of
restrictions and retrogressions in access to legal abortion care
across the country,” Elizabeth Broderick, panel vice-chair, said at
the time.
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The U.S. statement cited allegations of forced abortions and sterilisations in
China's western region of Xinjiang and urged the panel to focus on "actual human
rights abuses".
A lack of comment on such issues was "one of the reasons that the United States
and others increasingly see the U.N.’s human rights system as utterly broken".
U.S. President Donald Trump, seeking re-election in November, works closely with
evangelical Christians and puts their causes of restricting abortion and
preserving gun ownership at the top of his policy agenda.
(Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay; Editing by Nick Macfie)
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