A leading opponent of China's one-child policy – which includes forced abortions – is warning the United Nations that the communist nation has not "eased" its policy as it has claimed.
In an appearance at the U.N., Reggie Littlejohn, president of Womens Rights Without Frontiers, said reports abound that China has softened the policy, giving the false impression that it has abandoned coercive family planning.
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"It has not," she told the U.N. "Rather, China has merely lifted the ban on a second child, if either parent is an only child. This is not a wholesale 'easing' of the one-child policy. It is a minor adjustment."
Littlejohn noted that as recently as March 6, Li Bin, minister in charge of the National Health and Family Planning Commission, stated: "The basic family planning principle has not changed as the country is still the world's most populous.' She also stated that there is 'no timetable for allowing every couple to have a second child."
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WND reported late last year that even the government-controlled Chinese news agency admitted the announced change in China's one-child policy would not significantly reduce violence against women and girls in the form of selective abortions.
Xinhua had said the one-child policy was being relaxed. The change would affect only a fraction of families, as it purportedly would allow a couple to have a second child if the husband or wife is an only-child. The previous requirement was that both husband and wife be only-children before a second child would be permitted.
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Headlines worldwide immediately declared the policy was being relaxed.
But WND reported Littlejohn insisted the change was insignificant.
"While we are glad for the second babies who will be born under this adjustment, instituting a two-child policy in certain, limited circumstances will not end forced abortion or forced sterilization," she said at the time.
Then a new Xinhua report confirmed Chinese officials believe that the "birth policy changes are no big deal."
At the time, Wang Peian, deputy director of the National Health and Family Planning Commission, told Xinhua that "the number of couples covered by the new policy is not very large across the country."
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See the petition to stop China's "War on Women."
Littlejohn had warned: "Regardless of the number of children allowed, women who get pregnant without permission will still be dragged out of their homes, strapped down to tables and forced to abort babies that they want, even up to the ninth month of pregnancy. It does not matter whether you are pro-life or pro-choice on this issue. No one supports forced abortion, because it is not a choice."
In her warning to the U.N., she said: "While many women in the United States and internationally suffer from domestic violence while pregnant, only in China are women dragged out of their homes and forcibly aborted and sterilized by their government. China's one-child policy causes more violence against pregnant women than any other official policy on earth and any other official policy in the history of the world. Forced abortion is official government rape."
She also said the U.N. should investigate what goes on in China, noting that former Secretary of State Colin Powell found the UNFPA to be complicit with coercive family planning in China.
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Littlejohn noted that the European Parliament passed a resolution strongly condemning forced abortion and involuntary sterilization in China and globally, citing Feng Jianmei, who was forcibly aborted at seven months in June 2012.
The resolution "strongly condemns the decision to force Ms. Feng to have an abortion and condemns the practice of forced abortions and sterilizations globally, especially in the context of the one-child policy."
Littleton said that for decades, the UNFPA has worked "hand in hand with the Chinese population control machine, which is coercive. We have no doubt that any unbiased investigation by the European Parliament, the United Nations, or any other governmental body will reveal that UNFPA is complicit with coercive family planning in China."
Littlejohn said the problem with the one-child policy is not the number of children allowed but the fact that the government is" telling women how many children they can have and then enforcing that limit through forced abortion, forced sterilization and infanticide."
See Women's Rights Without Frontiers explain "gendercide," the practice of killing selected unborn because of their gender:
Littlejohn said that as a consequence of gendercide, an estimated 37 million Chinese men will never marry "because their future wives were terminated before they were born."
"This gender imbalance is a powerful, driving force behind trafficking in women and sexual slavery, not only in China, but in neighboring nations as well," Littlejohn said.