Bush’s Global Gag Rule: Death by Decree

melissa upreti

In "Bush’s Global Gag Rule: Death by Decree" Melissa Upreti, an attorney with the Center for Reproductive Rights, explains that Bush’s Gag Rule on population programs in developing countries spreads disinformation and non-democratic principles, abrogates women’s rights, causes death and destruction in the name foreign aid. She cautions that the Global Gag Rule will do little to reduce the numbers of abortions among needy women throughout the developing world, but rather thousands of women will die or suffer permanent disability as a result of the re-imposition of this nefarious restriction on American foreign aid
by President George W. Bush.

Melissa Upreti is the legal adviser for Asia with the International Legal Program for the
Center for Reproductive Rights.

See further: a brief bio of Ms. Upreti.

Further Reading about the Global Gag Rule
  • On January 23rd President Obama repealed the "global gag rule," also known as the "Mexico City" Policy, which denies federal funding to international family planning organizations that with their own funds provide abortion services and information. |MORE

  • "The 'gag rule's' restrictions, which would be unconstitutional if applied in the United States, jeopardize the health of women and their families..." according to a special EngenderHealth report. ->> Read more
  • "Two weeks ago a 22 or 23-year-old medical student died of an unsafe abortion. This made the news because the person trying to provide that abortion tried to burn the woman’s body. We need to look at why did she have to die, to look at the circumstances that surround the event. It boils down to people don’t want to talk about it." ->> Read more in Breaking the Silence -- The Global Gag Rule’s Impact on Unsafe Abortion, prepared by The Center for Reproductive Rights.
  • The GLOBAL GAG RULE has closed clinics, curtailed family planning and maternal and child health care services, and weakened the collective Kenyan NGO response to HIV/AIDS..." proclaims the study, spearheaded by Population Action International in collaboration with EngenderHealth, Ipas, Pathfinder International and PPFA. Don't miss: Access Denied with its country-by-country detailing of the shameful impact. This report is frequently updated.
  • View gripping video produced in conjunction with written reports.
  • "The Bush Administration’s gag rule is contributing to the global crisis of unsafe abortion. It is preventing local reproductive health groups from responding to the daily tragedy of women who are needlessly dying from unsafe abortions..." ->> Read more in Breaking the Silence: The Global Gag Rule’s Impact on Unsafe Abortion published by the Center for Reproductive Rights. Or download report in pdf format.
  • "Last May, Stephen Mumo Muia, a night watchman, saw three men in a dark blue pickup truck dump something into the Ngong River, a polluted waterway on the outskirts of Nairobi. Mr. Muia said he tried to chase the men, but they slipped into the night.
    "In their wake, he found black plastic bags stuffed with 15 fetuses, one full-term...Family planning activists in Kenya, the U.S., Canada and Britain believe that Kenya's increase in illegal abortions is an indirect and unintended consequence of Mr. Bush's 'global gag rule,' which denies U.S. aid to international family-planning programs that counsel abortion or advocate for changes in abortion laws..." ->> Read more in a two part series on the Global Gag Rule appearing October 23 & 24 in the Ottawa Citizen (Canada).
 

Brief Bio for Melissa Upreti

Melissa Upreti is the Center for Reproductive Rights' legal adviser for Asia with the International Legal Program. She is spearheading two regional research projects that constitute part of the acclaimed Women of the World series of reports in South Asia and East and South East Asia.

  • She led a fact-finding mission to investigate women in prison for abortion in Nepal and is co-author of Abortion in Nepal: Women Imprisoned.
  • She also designed and led several advocacy initiatives for the Center in Nepal, which contributed to the decriminalization of abortion in 2002.
  • Prior to joining the Center in 2000, Ms. Upreti was a Program Officer at the Asia Foundation in Nepal, an assistant to a Senior Advocate in the Supreme Court of Nepal, and a researcher and counselor at the Legal Aid & Consultancy Center in Nepal.
  • Ms. Upreti graduated with honors from North Bengal University in India; she received her Master of Laws from the Columbia University School of Law, where she was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar.

Back to top