Sep 22, 2004 / 22:00 pm
The Costa Rican President, Dr. Abel Pacheco called on U.N. member nations at the General Assembly on Monday September 21 to join Costa Rica in working towards an international ban against human cloning.
“As we have an obligation to protect the oppressed and victimized,” said the president, “we also have the obligation to protect those who don’t have a voice. I am referring to the imperative necessity to agree on an internationally binding set of norms for the safeguarding of the dignity of human life from the moment of conception.”
“The defense of life is, necessarily, the defense of the of the essence of man: of all the promises, joys and hopes of the human being,” he continued.
Dr. Pacheco said that, “I believe in science with ethical limits. As a doctor I reject human cloning while at the same time firmly supporting research into adult stem cells, which do not present ethical or juridical difficulties.”
He appealed to the member nations “to join us in working towards the adoption of an international convention that prohibits all forms of human cloning.”
U.S. President George W. Bush has stated the U.S. government’s support for the Costa Rican initiative at the U.N. General Assembly.