De Croo defends global women’s and gay rights in UN speech

Belgium’s international development minister, Alexander De Croo, defended the rights of women, gays, lesbians and transgender people in a speech at the United Nations in New York earlier this week.

De Croo (Open VLD) was speaking to the UN’s Commission on Population and Development, which is currently chaired by Belgium. The minister said that women had a right to education, along with a right not to be forced into marriage. He also insisted that young women had a right to take responsibility for their sexual and reproductive health.

“More than half of the world’s population is women, yet women are fighting all over the world for their basic rights,” he said.

He told the committee that Belgian schools served as an example by offering sexual education to students as well as free contraceptives. This helped to give the country one of the world’s lowest levels of teenage pregnancies and infant mortality rate. “Young people need access to information to make informed choices,” he said.

De Croo also held Belgium up as an example to follow in protecting the rights of gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender (LGBT) people. He pointed out that Belgium was one of the first countries in the world, along with the Netherlands, to legalise marriage for same-sex couples.

“Discrimination against LGBTs has far-reaching repercussions,” he said. “How can we ever achieve efficient sexual health policies when certain groups are deliberately excluded from society?”

De Croo is pushing for sexual and reproductive health rights to be incorporated into the UN’s new Sustainable Development Goals, which will replace the Millennium Goals when they expire at the end of this year.

photo: Alexander De Croo at the meeting of the UN’s Commission on Population and Development in New York

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