A key UN treaty monitoring body has has attacked the Russian Federation for promoting motherhood and women being able to stay at home with their newborn children.

The CEDAW committee of the UN, which monitors the implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), argued that Russia should instead be facilitating the quick return of women to paid employment, according to the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute (C-Fam).

Before the CEDAW committee, the Russian Federation delegation highlighted a new two-year program of the Ministry of Health that focused on the prevention of abortion and the protection of life.

The delegation reported that for the first time in decades, the birth rate was now exceeding the abortion rate and that the “declining number of abortions was also decreasing women’s mortality rates after birth or abortion.”

Nevertheless, the Cuban expert on the CEDAW committee warned of the negative sexual stereotypes that could result if women were only seen as “good mothers, good wives, and caretakers, while men were seen as the economic providers.”

In other country reviews, Fiji was taken to task for not making marriage and reproductive technologies available to same-sex couples. The Thailand expert inquired of Fiji if the decriminalization of prostitution for adult sex workers could be proposed. Albania was asked, “What was the government doing to fight homophobia and violence against gays, lesbians, and transsexuals?”

The CEDAW treaty does not mention abortion, nor do the words “gender,” “orientation,” “sexual,” or “reproductive” appear anywhere in the text. The observations and recommendations made by treaty bodies are non-binding, as only States Parties to a treaty have the authority collectively to interpret a treaty.

Meanwhile, C-Fam also report that another UN body, Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) controversially voted this week on a US-led initiative to accredit a leading international homosexual rights groups, without going through the standard procedures.

The move gives the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) official Non Governmental Organisation (NGO) status at the UN.

The group is one of the leading promoters of the controversial “Yogyakarta Principles”, a document which calls for “sexual orientation and gender identity” to be new categories of nondiscrimination in UN human rights treaties.

Among other things the Yogyakarta Principles calls for criminal penalties against those who criticise homosexuality.

The move by ECOSOC effectively bypassed a subsidiary committee’s decision to defer action on the group until it answered questions about its support of new homosexual ‘rights,’ which many Member States believe directly conflict with recognized rights to freedom of religion and freedom of expression.

The US has been an active champion of IGLHRC’s application to the UN since the June meeting of the committee on non-governmental organisations when US representatives insisted on an immediate vote on IGLHRC even though other committee members still had unanswered questions.

In response to the US attempt to force a decision, Egypt called for a procedural “no action” motion.

A number of UN member states have expressed growing concern about clergy members being charged with “hate speech” for preaching traditional religious teachings on sexual morality.

In June, one member of the NGO committee asked IGLHRC “if a religion teaches that sexual relations other than between a man and a woman within wedlock is wrong, would IGLHRC support the prosecution of a religious preacher for what he or she preaches against homosexuality?” IGLHRC has refused to answer the question.

The resolution to grant IGLHRC accreditation passed with 23 in favor, 13 against, 13 abstentions, with 5 absences.

The ECOSOC Council has overturned seven other NGO Committee decisions to reject the applications of homosexual rights groups in the last decade. This week’s vote, however, marks the first time that the ECOSOC council has granted accreditation without a prior NGO Committee decision on the application.