On Women's Rights, Iran Becomes a 'Friend'
Marie Cocco
29 April 2003

Americans are scared of the ayatollahs of Iran. They pushed out our shah and took our hostages and now want to export their brand of fundamentalism to Iraq. Even Donald Rumsfeld is spooked. The defense secretary warns Iran against meddling in Iraq.

To all appearances, Iran remains an adversary, a charter member of the axis of evil. That is, if you believe what you see. What you don't see is that at the United Nations, Iran is one of our new best friends, at least when it comes to women's rights.

The United States sided repeatedly with Iran and other repressive regimes at the annual session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women last month. The commission's agenda was to address women and technology, and violence against women. The first topic wasn't controversial. The second was.

The American delegation joined with Iran, Pakistan, Sudan, Libya and others in efforts to delete a phrase - included in previously agreed-upon UN statements dating back a decade - that calls on countries to condemn violence against women and "refrain from invoking any custom, tradition or religious consideration" to avoid the obligation to stop the violence.

It joined objections to a passage about women in armed conflict, aligning itself with fundamentalist regimes in trying to change a reference to "forced pregnancy" - listed along with murder, rape, systematic rape and sexual slavery as by-products of war and societies emerging from conflict. The term "forced pregnancy" is seen by some anti-abortion groups as a pretext for promoting abortion.

"I don't think we're aligning ourselves with countries who have bad records on human rights," said Ellen Sauerbrey, a former Republican candidate for Maryland governor and President George W. Bush's chief representative to the commission.

The State Department's 2002 human rights report says that in Iran, "abuse in the family was a private matter and was seldom discussed publicly." Rape is illegal, but with the law rarely enforced, it is "a widespread problem." Also, the testimony of a woman in a court proceeding is worth half that of a man's. And, the State Department reports, "The 'blood money' paid to the family of a female crime victim is half the sum paid for a man."

Anyway, Sauerbrey said, the positions she took were part of an effort to achieve consensus in a forum where all participants must agree on a final document. In fact, the controversy over halting violence against women disrupted the proceedings and no final statement was issued - for the first time ever. It so happens that the changes pushed by the ayatollahs dovetailed with attempts by American social and religious conservatives who were appointed by the White House as representatives to the UN commission.

"For too long, the feminists have been pushing a radical, special-interest agenda under the erroneous mantra made rhetorical cliche by Hillary Clinton: 'Women's rights are human rights,'" writes Janice Crouse, an official of the conservative group Concerned Women for America and a member of the U.S. delegation. Concerned Women for America, in comments about the commission session on its Web site, said it objected to language on preventing "custom, tradition or religious consideration" as excuses for violence against women. "It starkly projects custom, tradition and religion as negative influences," the group said. The organization, along with the National Right to Life Committee, also objected to use of the term "forced pregnancy" in the section on the abuse of women in armed conflict.

"It so happens there are times when there are issues where social conservatives, whether they be Muslim or Christian, find common ground," Sauerbrey said in explaining the groups' influence.

The alliance isn't new - it took root when the Bush administration took over. But it is often unseen. The United States has frequently sided at the UN with countries such as Algeria, Libya, Sudan, Iran and Iraq - when it was still controlled by Sad - dam Hussein - in battles over language involving women and children's rights.
So, to figure out why our adversaries are sometimes allies, here is a good rule of thumb. They are members of the axis of evil when they endanger our geopolitical interests. But not when they endanger women's lives.

Copyright (c) 2003, Newsday, Inc.
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