The unwanted baby girls: lifting the lid on gendercide
(Vatican Radio) China has ushered in a change of its leaders but many human rights
activists are asking whether there will be a change in the nation’s one child policy
with its controversial use of forced abortions. A UN expert has estimated that 200
million women are missing in the world today mainly in China and India due to the
sex-selection abortion of baby girls. A leading activist again the forced abortion
and gendercide taking place in China today is Reggie Littlejohn, president of the
NGO, Women’s Rights Without Frontiers. She has been promoting a shocking new video
called “It’s a girl” that exposes the gendercide in nations like China and India that
have a strong traditional preference for boys over girls. She spoke to Vatican Radio’s
Susy Hodges.
Listen to the extended interview with Reggie Littlejohn:
Littlejohn
says what is so distressing about China's non-child policy is not so much the number
of children allowed but "the coercion involved." She describes one recent case of
forced abortion that came to their attention of a Chinese woman "who was dragged out
(of her house) and "strapped down to a table and forced to abort a baby at 7 months."
Littlejohn says there are photos of that incident that are "creating outrage" wherever
they are being shown.
When it comes to India where there is also a strong
traditional preference for baby boys over baby girls, Littlejohn says one human rights
organisation has estimated that the lives of "50 million girls have been snuffed
out in India" due to the practice of sex selection abortion.
This practice
has also led to a growing disparity between the number of baby boys and baby girls.
Littlejohn says that in China there are an estimated "37 million more men living
today than women" precisely because so many baby girls are being aborted. Another
negative effect of this skewed ratio between men and women, says Littlejohn is that
"it is driving human trafficking and sexual slavery."
Asked why China's communist
authorities maintain this one-child policy despite these negative effects, Littlejohn
believes it is because it is a way to "instill terror in people" as it applies to
everybody regardless of their social crank or standing. The Chinese Communist Party,
she continues, needs "this infrastructure of coercion to keep the entire social structure
under their thumb."