On August 10, 2015, Women’s Rights Without Frontiers (WRWF) filed a complaint with the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women regarding coercive population control in China.
WRWF is a non-profit, non-partisan international coalition that aims to bring awareness and an end to forced abortion and sex slavery in China. They work to not only expose the violence and violations of human rights, but to help the victims as well.
The founder and president of WRWF Reggie Littlejohn writes in the letter that WRWF has submitted complaints for four years, but China has yet to respond. The complaint reads:
The One-Child Policy causes more violence against women and girls than any other official policy on earth.
It is China’s war on women. Any discussion of women’s rights, or human rights, would be a charade if forced abortion in China is not front and center. It does not matter whether you are pro-life or pro-choice on this issue. No one supports forced abortion, because it is not choice.
China’s One-Child Policy has been in the headlines for decades with news of companies punishing employees who have unscheduled children, monthly abortion quotas, and women being restrained while their children are ripped from their bodies and killed. Because of the one child policy, men in China outnumber women by at least 37 million.
Women, including those from foreign countries, are sometimes forced into prostitution, labor, and marriage. In fact, WRWF notes that the UN listed China on their Tier 2 Watch List in its annual Trafficking in Persons report stating that the Chines government “does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking.”
Littlejohn writes that despite “tweaks” to the One-Child Policy that are likely just a façade, she doesn’t believe the Chinese government will end the One-Child Policy despite the dangerously low birth rate and ramifications of the policy. After 35 years, Littlejohn notes, even if the policy were done away with, it would likely be too little too late.
WRWF’s complaint asks that the UN urge the Chinese government to abolish the One-Child Policy, offer incentives for couples to give birth to their daughters rather than abort, and offer pensions to couples with daughters. The group also ask the UN to defund the United Nations Population Fund until it stops supporting forced abortion and sterilization in China.
