The administration of US President Donald Trump on Monday said it was cutting off US funding to the UN agency for reproductive health, accusing the agency of supporting population control programs in China that include coercive abortion.
By halting assistance to the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), the Trump administration is following through on promises to let socially conservative policies that Trump embraced in his campaign determine the way the US government operates and conducts itself in the world.
Though focused on forced abortion — a concept opposed by liberals and conservatives alike — the move to invoke the “Kemp-Kasten amendment” was sure to be perceived as a gesture to anti-abortion advocates and other conservative interests.
The UN fund will lose US$32.5 million in funding from this year’s budget, the US Department of State said, with funds shifted to similar programs at the US Agency for International Development.
It was not immediately clear whether the UN fund would also lose out on tens of millions of additional dollars it has typically received from the US in “non-core” funds.
Under a three-decade-old law, the US is barred from funding organizations that aid or participate in forced abortion or involuntary sterilization. It is up to each administration to determine which organizations meet that condition.
The UN Population Fund has typically been cut off during Republican administrations and had its funding resumed when Democrats control the White House.
The US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations was notified of the move by the Department of State in a letter received on Monday. The letter followed a formal designation by US Undersecretary for Political Affairs Tom Shannon that said the fund “supports, or participates in the management of, a program of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization.”
In a lengthy memorandum obtained by The Associated Press, the Department of State said the UN fund partners with China’s National Health and Family Planning Commission, responsible for overseeing China’s “two-child policy” — a loosened version of the notorious “one-child policy” in place from 1979 to 2015.
It said the UN collaborates with the Chinese agency on family planning. Still, the memo acknowledged there was no evidence of UN support for forced abortions or sterilization in China.
The UN Population Fund said it regretted the US move, adding that it was “erroneous” to suggest it was complicit in China’s policies.
“UNFPA refutes this claim, as all of its work promotes the human rights of individuals and couples to make their own decisions, free of coercion or discrimination,” the agency said in a statement.
RESTAURANT POISONING? Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang at a press conference last night said this was the first time bongkrekic acid was detected in Taiwan An autopsy discovered bongkrekic acid in a specimen collected from a person who died from food poisoning after dining at the Malaysian restaurant chain Polam Kopitiam, the Ministry of Health and Welfare said at a news conference last night. It was the first time bongkrekic acid was detected in Taiwan, Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang (王必勝) said. The testing conducted by forensic specialists at National Taiwan University was facilitated after a hospital voluntarily offered standard samples it had in stock that are required to test for bongkrekic acid, he said. Wang told the news conference that testing would continue despite
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)