| CanWest News Service |
Saturday, July 21, 2007
Canada's Hugh Adsett said the UN should be where "diverse voices" can be heard, and "even if some governments don't agree with some [activists], they should not be excluded," note-takers reported.
The charge led to UN approval for the Coalition gaie et lesbienne du Quebec to receive "observer" status at the world body.
But Canada's siding with political activists who'd upset China over the international status of Taiwan -- which Beijing considers to be a Chinese province -- wasn't enough to prevent a one-year suspension of their group from the "observer" list.
After Adsett said Canada "deplored" the action against Liberal International, Cuba's Maria Del Carmen claimed China had acted out of a "spirit of flexibility, understanding and compromise."
The drama took place in Geneva at a meeting of the Economic and Social Council -- a central UN arm run by 54 member governments, including Canada's.
Among other business, the council was reviewing recommendations from its 19-member committee on non-governmental organizations about giving groups permission to campaign at ECOSOC meetings as "observers."
Committee members Egypt, Guinea, Pakistan, Qatar and Sudan led the successful blocking of the Quebec group's application in January despite its strong record in Canada as a bona-fide campaigner.
The vote reflected hostility towards the idea of homosexuality in many parts of the world -- in particular in Muslim countries, but also by the governments of some big powers such as China and Russia.
But the countries holding those views form a far smaller proportion of the ECOSOC membership, and the vote was 22 in the Quebec group's favour, 13 against, 13 abstentions and the rest absent. "We're surprised and happy," said Yvan Lapointe, CGLQ executive director, who said his group now planned to use the UN as a platform to spread homosexual rights to many of the same countries that voted against it.
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