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POLITICS: Observers Expect U.N. Cloning Controversy to Resurface Peter Deselaers UNITED NATIONS, Dec 5 (IPS) - One of the most controversial items on this year's U.N. General Assembly agenda, human cloning, could be brought back to life next week after an earlier vote to delay the debate until 2005 passed narrowly, 80-79. Both Costa Rica and the United States have indicated they are unsatisfied with the recommendation made by the Assembly's legal committee and want U.N. member states to support their proposal for a ban on all cloning. Belgium, on the other hand, led the states that pushed to ban human cloning but to permit the practice for research purposes, also known as therapeutic cloning. The two positions were deadlocked at November's legal committee meeting, leading to the compromise motion to delay the vote for two years. The General Assembly typically follows the recommendations of its various committees. While both resolutions call for a ban on human reproductive cloning, they vary on the restrictions they impose on therapeutic cloning. The Costa Rican proposal calls for a ban on all forms of human cloning. ''We have 66 co-sponsors from every region and every religion of the world,'' Ambassador Bruno Stagno Ugarte of Costa Rica told IPS. The United States and Spain have cosponsored the Costa Rican resolution. But Belgium has called on states to control non-reproductive cloning by either adopting a ban, imposing a moratorium, or regulating the practice by national legislation. Twenty-three countries supported that resolution, including Turkey, Brazil and the United Kingdom. Conventions of the U.N. General Assembly are not binding on member states. But a strong majority vote on a proposed convention can send a strong political message. As member states could not reach a consensus in the legal committee, Iran put forth a procedural motion on behalf of the 56-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), calling for the vote on the controversial resolutions to be put off for two years. The divisive vote on Iran's motion was 80 in favour to 79 against, with 15 abstentions. ''We are trying to get the one vote that we lacked,'' Carlos Fernando Diaz Paniagua of Costa Rica told IPS. Diaz Paniagua confidently predicted that if his country succeeds in overturning the procedural motion to postpone, it would win the following vote on the resolution. One of the main arguments against postponement is the urgent need for regulation. When Germany and France introduced the topic, ”they said it was urgent”, Diaz Paniagua said. ”If it is urgent, why are we going to postpone it and not discuss it?'' he asked.. Supporters of the Costa Rican resolution regard every kind of cloning as a danger to human dignity, because scientists have to ”produce” embryos for the research. The Holy See is a strong supporter of the Costa Rican resolution. The representative of Nigeria expressed concern that ”developing countries, especially in Africa, are most likely at risk as easy targets to source the billions of embryos required for scientific experimentation”. The ”commercialisation of human cloning will definitely threaten the social and demographic stability of the developing countries,'' he said, adding that the resources used in those experiments would be better invested in sustainable development. Cloning is still in an experimental stage. But according to scientists, the possible benefits of cloning research include producing human cells for transplants, repairing damaged tissues, and even finding a cure to genetically caused illnesses such as Parkinsons. In both kinds of cloning, scientists implant the nucleus of an adult donor cell into an egg whose nucleus has been removed. The egg develops into a blastocyst, a four or five-day-old embryo, consisting of about 250 cells. For reproductive cloning this embryo would be implanted into a uterus; for therapeutic cloning the cells are removed and used to grow human tissues. Supporters of the Belgian resolution argue there is no international consensus on therapeutic cloning so that decisions on its use should be left to individual states. But there is global consensus on the need for a ban on reproductive cloning, they add. Michael Dorsey, associate professor for social sciences at Dartmouth College, told IPS he is concerned about scientists moving to countries where cloning is not banned and might not be regulated. This will happen if ''there was only a spotty, patchy ban on human cloning”, Dorsey predicts. That is why he says the process to ban cloning, ''needs to be fast-tracked, because humanity is facing a potential threat to life'', he said. Not a single country has said that it does not want to ban human reproductive cloning, Dorsey stressed, so states need to make the first move and ''commit themselves to ban human cloning”. Afterward they can work out their political differences over therapeutic cloning research, he added. Votes for and against the OIC-sponsored motion in the legal committee were widely spread amongst all groupings of member states. More than 10 OIC members voted against Iran's motion, including Albania, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Tajikistan and Uganda. Benin, Chad and Turkmenistan, which are all OIC members as well as co-sponsors of the Costa Rican resolution, did not vote at all. While Germany, France and the United Kingdom voted in favour of the OIC motion, other states of the European Union voted against it, including Italy, Austria, Norway and Poland. The General Assembly will discuss the legal committee's recommendation next week. If Costa Rica and its supporters gather enough votes to overthrow that decision, the member states will have to vote on the two resolutions. If they adopt one of the proposals, an ad hoc committee will be reconvened to prepare a convention to control and regulate cloning based on the adopted resolution. The legal committee would then discuss the convention itself at the 2004 session of the General Assembly. (END/2003) Reference: Centre for Genetics and Society http://www.genetics-and-society.org/ Centre for International Environmental Law http://www.ciel.org/ Ad Hoc Committee on an International Convention Against the Reproductive Cloning of Human Beings http://www.un.org/law/cloning// SOURCE: Inter Press Service News Agency http://www.ipsnews.net/interna.asp?idnews=21431 * * * ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn