At the “Beijing +5” conference, held in New York from June 5 to 10, the delegation from the Holy See was caught up in a heated controversy with feminist groups—a controversy reminiscent of the disputes that dominated the Beijing Conference itself.

Kathryn Hoomkwap, the Nigerian woman who headed the Holy See’s delegation to the Beijing +5 meeting, said that the final document approved by the conference gave excessive attention to issues of sexuality and reproduction. She lamented that the UN meeting had not paid greater attention to issues such as violence against women, economic rights, political involvement, access to social services, education, health care, and nutrition.

The Holy See’s representatives also protested that feminists were seeking to introduce broad, vague terms into the language of the UN resolutions, and then subsequently define those terms in ways that would fit their own ideological agenda. The term “reproductive freedom” is an example of that technique; it has been defined by UN agencies to include access to legal abortion.

In an effort to clarify the position of the Holy See, in view of the use of such imprecise language, Hoomkwap issued a statement indicating that “nothing the Holy See has done” during the Beijing +5 conference should be interpreted as suggesting support for abortion or the use of contraceptive devices. She reiterated the position of the Catholic Church that every human life should be protected from the moment of conception until natural death.

As the conference ended on June 10, pro-life and pro-family groups proclaimed victory against abortion and other attacks on life and morality, while feminist groups applauded language attacking violence against women and other issues.

The Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute (C-fam) said radical feminists had hoped to use Beijing+5 to force advocacy of “sexual orientation,” “sexual rights,” and “reproductive health” on unwilling nations. In one case, the broad-based pro-family coalition was able to hold onto language that said: “in no case should abortion be promoted as a method of family planning.”

On the last day of the review, campaigners were upbeat as nation after nation told the US and European Union that freedom of sexual orientation should not enter the conference’s final document, as their delegates had promoted. In the end, conference managers decided that if new language could not be agreed upon, then the new document had to revert to language from the old Beijing conference, which the pro-family coalition had supported.

Austin Ruse of C-fam said: “According to UN insiders, part of the credit for this pro-family victory rests with the ‘bureau,’ a small number of UN members states that decide the rules of the conference. This year they insisted on the classic definition of consensus, which means that any three states can strike something from the document under debate.” Among the most prominent countries standing on the pro-family side were Poland, Nicaragua, Egypt, Pakistan, Libya, Sudan, Senegal, Iran, and the Holy See.

Meanwhile, organizers trumpeted gains in measures against trafficking in women for sex, education, human rights, poverty, debt, land and inheritance rights, and political participation. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a statement issued by his spokesman, Fred Eckhard, after the document was adopted that he was “delighted at the outcome.”

However the director of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) reportedly wept in anger before delivering a speech to the UN General Assembly at the end of the Beijing+5, according C-fam.

A UN delegate told C-fam that Nafis Sadik wept as she angrily edited her statement concerning the Beijing+5 review after pro-family forces prevented feminists from enshrining “reproductive and sexual rights” as UN policy.

“I had hoped to deliver a different sort of statement today, pointing out all the progress that has been made by women and on behalf of women since we met five years ago in Beijing,” Sadik told the session. “I had hoped to be able to join in congratulating all the participants in this process for your work to consolidate the movement towards equality and justice for all the world’s people. Unfortunately, it seems that this Special Session is still unable to agree on language concerning some of the most basic human rights as they affect women.”

Sadik also accused opponents of wanting “death, disease, and suffering” for women and girls by denying them access to legalized abortion. Sadik said she had wanted to include a provision that would have required medical personnel to learn how to perform abortions even if it violated their consciences. The proposal was defeated.

C-fam said Sadik’s anger may have been due to the fact that she is soon to leave the UN and had hoped pro-abortion gains at Beijing+5 would have been her legacy.

The letter to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan asked him to investigate the Vatican and the Franciscan order, and persuade the Vatican to open wartime archives, or face “appropriate action” to encourage it to do so. The Vatican maintains that its archives must remain secret because they contain details of sacramental matters. The Vatican is also a permanent observer at the UN, while Franciscans International is a recognized non-governmental organization at the UN.

The group of victims and relatives of victims who are bringing the lawsuit against the Vatican Bank, the Franciscans, and the Croatian Liberation Movement, which they said was understood to be the “direct successors to the Ustashe”—the wartime fascist organization which ruled Croatia—in a San Francisco district court. The suit alleges that gold and other assets worth about $170 million today, not including interest, were looted by the Ustashe and safeguarded by the Vatican after World War II.

In their letter to Annan, the victims charge that some members of the Franciscan order collaborated with the Ustashe, were actively involved in atrocities, and knowingly helped wanted Ustashe war criminals, including its notorious leader Ante Pavelic, to escape justice after the war. They say the Vatican organized and financed the “rat line” which enabled leading Nazis and Ustashe members to escape to Latin America. The escape route was allegedly partly funded by assets stolen from concentration camp and other victims, looted by the Ustashe, and removed to the Vatican. The Vatican has consistently denied all the allegations.

The House voted 416-1 for a nonbinding resolution objecting to the effort led by the group Catholics for a Free Choice to end the Vatican’s permanent observer status at the UN, which it has used to lead the fight against the pro-abortion and radical feminist agenda.

CFFC claims to have more than 400 groups in its See Change campaign, but pro-Vatican groups at the UN collected signatures from over 4,000 groups in less than six months supporting the Holy See.

“If anything the Holy See deserves a more prominent role in the United Nations,” said Rep. Christopher Smith, R-New Jersey, author of the nonbinding resolution.

“This attack against the Vatican strikes at our bedrock democratic values that teach us tolerance for legitimate differences of opinion,” House Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Texas, said in support of the resolution.