On abortion: Amnesty International OR the Vatican Secretary of State. Which side are you on?

[demoleft]

This summer's struggle.

In its "Statement from Amnesty International in response to Vatican Secretary of State", A.I. defines once and for all its policy.
What's more important to me, it states a battlefield side which is now more than ever clear.

"21 August 2007
Yesterday the Vatican's Secretary of State, Tarcisio Bertone, commented on Amnesty International's policy on sexual and reproductive rights -- including on selected aspects of abortion -- and said that the view of the Vatican is that abortion should not be available to rape victims.

Amnesty International's policy on sexual and reproductive rights does not promote abortion as a universal right and the organization remains silent on the rights or wrongs of abortion. The policy recognizes women's human rights to be free of fear, threat and coercion as they manage all consequences of rape and other grave human rights violations. Amnesty International stands by its policy, adopted in April this year, that aims to support the decriminalisation of abortion, to ensure women have access to health care when complications arise from abortion and to defend women's access to abortion -- within reasonable gestational limits -- when their health or life are in danger."

Women who claim a right to choose are sentenced to death, arrested, prosecuted and imprisoned, threatened in their lives from dangerous pregnancies with complications - this happens every day in the world.
Not to mention war rapes - that in Christian Europe is fresh memory of the 90's, in Bosnia. This is a world tragedy too.

"Amnesty International finds it unacceptable for women to be imprisoned for seeking or obtaining an abortion, or for women to be denied access to abortion services even when the UN Committee on Human Rights has held that forcing a woman to carry a pregnancy to term that was a result of sexual violence in armed conflict is a form of torture; and in non-conflict situations cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. Amnesty International finds the preventable death of 70,000 women per year -- and the denial of medical services in a range of circumstances from ectopic pregnancies to complications from unsafe abortions -- to be unacceptable. These are a violation of a woman's right to life, right to health, right to be free from torture and cruel, inhuman degrading treatment and punishment and the right to non-discrimination."

And finally, the real point in matters like these, apart from religion and morals, the
"matter of whether individuals, of any faith, agree with or oppose Amnesty International's policy on sexual and reproductive rights, which includes selected aspects on abortion, is for the individual to decide and should be respected."

Indeed it should. So much for this summer heat on abortion, I hope.
Amnesty International, http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGPOL300192007

(I looked for Bertone's statements but could not find any original)