On September 6, the Bush administration once again made a formal "determination" that the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) is ineligible, under a longstanding federal anticoercion law, for the $34 million that Congress had set aside for it. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte sent a letter to Congress asserting that UNFPA supports China's coercive abortion policies. The action was predictable. President Bush first blocked a U.S. contribution to UNFPA in 2002, and has done so every year since, on the grounds that the agency indirectly violates the anticoercion law, despite the fact that the administration's own investigative team found no evidence to support this claim. UNFPA operates in more than 150 poor countries, but does not provide or pay for abortion services in any of them. Instead, UNFPA works to reduce the need for abortion by promoting voluntary family planning.
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The broad benefits of international family planning programs for women and children
