Many UN agencies are known for pressuring countries to change their cultures in exchange for financial relief. Most recently, the United Nations Human Rights Council demanded abortion for the Philippines, using the age-old claim that the general population would benefit economically from killing more of its preborn children.
"All they're doing is changing large poor families into small poor families," Brian Clowes of Human Life International (HLI) points out. "It's a real burden on these cultures that the elitists of the United States government and the United Nations don't understand that children are essential to the life of the family, and, in fact, they're the retirement program because they'll take care of the mother and the father when they're older."
But in this case, the Philippines, which is predominately Catholic, turned down the UN.
Philippine Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla reportedly said the pro-abortion recommendation from the United Nations Human Rights Council last month in Geneva conflicts with his nation's values.
"Culturally, our values may conflict with many of the values that [Western countries] want to impose upon us. We are not ready for that. That is our position right now," Remulla stated.
While the Asian country agreed with most of the UN recommendations on human rights, he said a few were "not acceptable," including the legalization of abortion, same-sex marriage, and divorce, The Diplomat reports.
"I've seen so many instances of them trying to use force all around the world, especially when there's a large typhoon or earthquake or something like that," Clowes says of the UN. "They'll go in there and say, 'Sure, we'll help you. We have plenty of money to help you. But first, you've got to do this, or you've got to do that.'"
The "this" or "that" usually involves abortion and/or homosexuality.
For example, when a hurricane ravaged Grenada in the Caribbean in 2005, the UN's World Health Organization agreed to help repair the extensive damage, but only if the island nation got rid of prayer in the schools.
