Human Rights For Disabled People In China

EDM number 564 in 1993-94, proposed by Liz Lynne on 09/02/1994.

That this House congratulates the Disability Now newspaper for revealing that a draft law presented to China's People's Congress on 20th December 1993 includes plans to use mass abortion and sterilisation to prevent the birth of disabled children; is appalled that China's Minister of Public Health, Chen Minzhang, has apparently attempted to justify this barbaric measure by saying that it is necessary to 'stop the prevalence of abnormal births'; is horrified that the draft law describes disabled babies as 'births of inferior quality'; notes with alarm that the draft law includes provision to ban women with certain illnesses and diseases from marrying; condemns the statement from the Xinhua news agency that 'more than 10 million disabled persons could have been prevented through better controls'; believes that this measure will transcend the political divide on the question of abortion as it has nothing to do with the choice of individual women, but has everything to do with the ethnic cleansing of babies who happen to be disabled; believes that human beings, whatever their disability, have a fundamental right as full and equal citizens; and calls upon the United Nations to recognise the breadth and depth of international outrage about this proposed law.

This motion has been signed by a total of 51 MPs.