The Resolution was passed on the heels of the release of a Global Study evaluating 15 years of implementation of Resolution 1325, as requested by the Security Council. The Study acknowledges that while progress has been made, significant challenges remain to implementing the Women, Peace & Security Agenda. One such challenge the study highlights specifically, is access to abortion for survivors of wartime sexual violence.
In line with a legal analysis first introduced by the Global Justice Center in 2011, the Study finds that the denial of abortions to female rape victims violates not only their right to medical care but also the prohibition on adverse distinction found in common Article 3, the Additional Protocols to the Geneva Conventions and customary international law.
The Study uses strong language to highlight that abortion services are a matter of lifesaving health care and part of the right to non-discriminatory medical care under international humanitarian law (IHL).
The Study also reaffirms the legal principle that IHL trumps local abortion laws in armed conflict, specifically identifying U.S. policy as a barrier to abortion access: “International human rights law and international humanitarian law apply universally, irrespective of national legislation. This includes the aid policy of the world’s largest donor, the United States, and the restrictive effect it has on the provision of abortion by humanitarian agencies worldwide.” Despite stark criticism from human rights and medical groups around the world, the United States continues to attach blanket abortion restrictions to its aid with no exceptions for rape, life endangerment or incest.
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