Women's rights? Hundreds of millions deprived

President Obama and other world leaders have marked International Women's Day for 2015, with Obama campaigning for equality and education.

But an organization that has battled China's deadly one-child policy for years says such messages totally ignore the hundreds of millions of women who are not alive to benefit.

Womens Rights Without Frontiers said Monday an estimated 200 million women won't be noting the events "because they are not alive."

WRWF said they were selectively aborted just because they were girls – victims of 'gendercide.'"

"Son preference runs amok in both China and India; both countries suffer from a vast gender imbalance, which in turn is driving human trafficking and sexual slavery," the group said.

Reggie Littlejohn, president of WRWF, said the "message of sex-selective abortion is that girls and women do not deserve to live."

"The selective elimination of 200 million women demands the passionate outrage of the women's movement," she said. "Indeed, eliminating the coercive enforcement of China's one-child policy – and the elimination of son preference and sex-selective abortion – should be the No. 1 priority of the international women's movement."

In his statement, Obama committed to seeking equality and education but said nothing about life.

"Women make immeasurable contributions," he wrote. "They are entrepreneurs, farmers, educators, scientists, artists, soldiers, mothers, heads of state – the list in endless. Without them, economies would collapse, political systems would deteriorate, and families and communities would fall apart."

But he said woman continue to be treated as "second-class citizens."

"Their abilities are undervalued. And their human rights – the right to learn, to express themselves, to live free from violence, to choose whether and whom to marry – are routinely violated."

He said educating girls is important: "Right now, 62 million girls worldwide who should be in school aren't. Millions more are at risk of losing their access to education."

And Obama promoted equality: "This is simply a matter of right and wrong. Women and girls are human beings, full and equal in rights and dignity. They deserve to be treated that way, everywhere, every day."

Beyond the deaths of hundreds of millions of girls in China, Littlejohn noted, even those who survive are deprived of other fundamental rights,

That's because Chinese women "who live under the iron fist of the one-child policy" have had stripped from them "the right to bear children."

"I find it impossible to celebrate any advancement of women's rights anywhere on earth, when one out of five women in the world is subject to a regime that will strap them down to tables, thrust its hands into their wombs and rip their little ones out, as these women scream and plead for the lives of babies they desperately want," Littlejohn said.

"The women's movement can claim no real victory so long as this scourge against women continues to blight the face of the earth. Chinese women cannot stand up against forced abortion without risking detention, for themselves and for their families. It is time for all women to rise up for our sisters in China and be a voice for the voiceless."

Littlejohn said her organization has started a "Save a Girl" campaign that already has saved more than 100 baby girls in China.

It includes sometimes a monthly stipend to mothers who are at risk of aborting their baby girls. The campaign also helps the mothers hide from the government to avoid forced abortions.

It also provides assistance when the government punishes dissidents by depriving their children of an education.

WND reported WRWF's warning that no one should be fooled by China's insistence that the one-child policy has been "eased," because the infamous forced abortions continue.

Littlejohn told WND at the time: "The government is still telling how many children people can have and is enforcing that limit with coerced abortions. And it's not clear to me that there are fewer abortions. Women and babies still are dying."

Littlejohn pointed out China still requires a birth permit for the first and second child.

"Without a permit, there still are forced abortions, unless you're rich enough to buy your way out," she said.

Her organization has created an Internet petition calling for an end to forced abortions.

She's also prepared a video on the issue:

It was on Jan. 1, 2014, when the Chinese Communist Party "tweaked" the policy that has brought forced abortion to hundreds of millions of women.

According to the new policy, some women – those who are only children themselves or have a husband who is an only child – are being allowed a second child, if they obtain permission.

But Littlejohn believes declaring any kind of victory in the fight against the one-child policy is "misleading" while women and babies in China are dying.

China's one-child policy, announced in 1979, is state-sponsored violence against women and children – including and especially the girl child – and constitutes massive crimes against humanity, critics have charged.