Today, voices against the war in Ukraine are being raised around the world. The human condition leads us to mourn the lives lost and honor those who prevent those deaths.
The widespread anguish caused by these events strikes a tragic contrast with the studied nonchalance of the Biden Administration, U.N. agencies, and abortion NGOs when it comes to the war on unborn children.
These abortion promoters celebrate the legal murder of thousands of unborn children. They rage when their efforts are opposed. They praise and support those who promote or perform abortions, while they defame and even persecute pro-lifers.
Casualties in the war against the unborn this year will far outnumber those in the Ukraine war, but they will be not be featured at all in the carefully orchestrated daily media coverage.
In the past year, the balance of political forces has changed in Ibero-America. Without Trump in the White House, international and local pro-abortion NGOs no longer have anything to fear. In the Biden Administration, ample financial support from U.S. taxpayers continues to flow, causing more unborn lives to be lost.
Let's take a brief look at some recent developments in the region.
The Peruvian Congress recently approved a declaration encouraging the nation's participation in the celebration of the Day of the Unborn Child. Although it is only a declaration (Peruvian laws already protect the right to life from conception), this public affirmation is of vital importance not only for Peru but for the region. Even more important is its wide margin of victory - it was approved by an overwhelming majority (77 votes in favor, 20 abstentions, and only 7 opposed).
In Peru, as in the entire region, local NGOs enjoy funding from PPFA, IPPF, and other abortion transnationals. The U.S. Agency for International Development (AID) is careful not to support abortion openly, but this key player among international anti-life forces supports other NGOs or governmental entities that, in turn, support pro-abortion NGOs.
With this support, authorities or parliamentarians in favor of the pro-abortion agenda zealously promote initiatives aimed at the legalization of abortion. For more than three years, one project in Peru has worked with gynecologists in private and public entities to that end. Their efforts aim to expand the concept of "therapeutic abortion" to include cases of rape or fetal malformations because they "affect the health of women."
A bill to decriminalize abortion in cases of rape was presented in 2021 and is awaiting debate and vote in Congress. The current Minister of Women, Diana Miloslavich, is a well-known feminist abortion activist. She recently has spoken out again in favor of abortion on demand. So has Janet Tello, a justice on the Supreme Court.
Peruvian bishops, most prominent among them Monsignor Javier Del Rio, Archbishop of Arequipa. have rejected these abortionist espousals. On a happier note, last Saturday the March for Life, the largest in Latin America, returned to the streets to celebrate the Day of the Unborn Child, established in Peruvian Law No. 27654.
On March 9, Guatemala was declared the "Pro-Life Capital of Latin America." The President of Guatemala, Alejandro Gianmattei, celebrated this official designation with an international gathering that confirmed his strong pro-life leadership and challenged once again all the international pro-abortion forces who so strongly oppose him.
That same day the Guatemalan Congress approved a nominally pro-family law but included some extraneous elements that increased the penal sanction of abortion for women. Equally unnecessary was a law banning same-sex marriage (Guatemalan law already defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman).
More than one international expert had warned of the danger that these new laws represent, recognizing that they might serve the strategy of abortionist and LGTBI groups. They might seize the opportunity to denounce the new laws before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. Undoubtedly, this ideological and pernicious Court would pronounce in favor of abortion and homosexual marriage, forcing Guatemala on the defensive.
Fortunately, President Gianmattei recognized this issue and asked the Congress to table the law. He la