01 Sep 1996 African-American Group Calls on Environmentalists to Stop Promoting Third-World Abortions – September 1996

Outraged over environmentalist groups, such as the League of Conservation Voters (LCV), supporting “family planning organizations” including those that perform abortions, the African-American leadership group Project 21 is demanding that environmentalists stop endorsing policies that disproportionately harm people of color.

“Environmental colonialism is here,” says Project 21 Chairman Edmund Peterson. “The agenda of radical ‘environmental’ groups like the LCV is to promote abortion as a family planning method to dominate families — often in nations located in continents like Africa and Asia — and seize control of third world countries.”

“This radical ‘environmental’ group, with their obsession for population control, has confirmed the often repeated theory that some liberals are pro-abortion because they see no other way to control the number of ‘those people’ being born,’ says Project 21 member Roderick Conrad, a researcher for the Department of Labor.

Project 21 members cite as an example the League of Conservation Voters’ 1996 scorecard that lists a “no” vote as the correct vote on an amendment offered by Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) to the Foreign Operations Appropriations bill that would have forbidden:

1. funds being used by any private, nongovernmental, or multilateral organizations that refuse to cerify they will not perform abortions in any foreign country, with exceptions for rape, incest, and the life of the mother;
2. violating the abortion laws of foreign countries or lobbying those countries to change their laws;
3. appropriating funds to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) until the President informs the appropriate congressional committees that the UNPFA has terminated all operations in China or China has ended their forced abortion policy.

Despite protests by the LCV and other environmental groups that current law already forbids funding abortions overseas, pro-life Democratic House Minority Whip David Bonior (D-MI) voted for the Smith amendment (1996 LCV rating: 85%) indicating that not even a pro-LCV ranking Democrat could trust their assurances that abortions would not be funded with U.S. money.

Critics of the Smith amendment criticize the elimination of UNFPA funding, saying that agency is not involved in China’s abortion policy. Supporters of the amendment contend the family planning agencies can’t be trusted. The y quote UNFPA’s Executive Director Dr. Nafis Sadik, who recently said: “China has every reason to feel proud of and pleased with its remarkable achievements made in its family planning policy and control of its population growth over the past 10 years. Now the country could offer its experiences and special experts to help other countries.”

For an interview with a Project 21 member, contact Project 21 at 202-507-6398.

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