HOLY SEE ASKS FOR BAN ON CLONING IN ALL ITS FORMS

VATICAN CITY, OCT 27, 2003 (VIS) - Made public today was the speech given by Archbishop Celestino Migliore, Holy See permanent observer to the United Nations, on October 21 in New York on Item 172 of the agenda of the 58th General Assembly: "International Convention Against the Cloning of Human Beings." His focus was the serious dangers that cloning involves for human dignity and the need for international agreements that regulate all aspects of cloning.

"My delegation," he stated, "wishes to reaffirm its view that the matter before us can be resolved through the earliest ban on human embryonic cloning. It must be clear that the position my delegation takes is not, in the first instance, a religious one. It is a position informed by the process of reason that is in turn informed by scientific knowledge."

"We have heard," the nuncio continued, "a number of statements from a variety of delegations that this is a 'complex' issue. ... The science may be complex, but the issue for us is simple and straightforward. The matter of human cloning that involves the creation of human embryos is the story of the beginning of human life ... (and is) a universal issue because an embryo is a human being regardless of its geography. If reproductive cloning of human beings contravenes the law of nature - a principle with which all delegations appear to agree - so does the cloning of the human embryo that is slated for research purposes. A cloned embryo (for this purpose) ... is destined for pre-programmed destruction."

"In closing," affirmed Archbishop Migliore, "my delegation wants to remind this distinguished assembly that one of the fundamental missions of the United Nations is to uphold the rights of all human beings. If the United Nations were to ban reproductive cloning without banning cloning for research, this would, for the first time, involve this body in legitimizing something extraordinary: the creation of human beings for the express purpose of destroying them."

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