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UNITED NATIONS-Opponents of a bid to have the U.N. General Assembly call for a moratorium on the death penalty tried to derail the resolution on Thursday by inserting amendments on the right to life of unborn children.The United States voted in favor of inserting an amendment that would have urged member states "to take all necessary measures to protect the lives of unborn children," lining up with Iran, Egypt, Syria, Zimbabwe and several Gulf countries.The measure was rejected by an 83-28 vote with 47 abstentions.U.S. representative Joseph Rees said the United States backed that amendment, although it abstained in a vote on a more strongly worded amendment that would have said abortion was only admissible in necessary cases, "in particular where the life of the mother and or the child is at serious risk.""We are in agreement with the view expressed in this (first) amendment that the lives of the unborn deserve the strongest protection, and we agree that countries that advocate for the abolition of the death penalty should be at least equally scrupulous in showing concern for innocent life," Rees told the General Assembly's human rights committee.Eighty-seven countries, including the 27 European Union states, jointly introduced the draft resolution calling for a moratorium on executions with a view to abolishing capital punishment.More than 15 amendments, including the two anti-abortion ones, were defeated in two days of acrimonious debate that saw Caribbean countries and others accusing the EU of seeking to impose its values on others.Barbados was among the most vocal in complaining that "a group of countries" was trying to impose its will, saying it had been threatened with the withdrawal of aid over the issue.The move by Egypt and other Muslim states to include the clauses on abortion and protecting unborn children was a clear effort to split the coalition behind the moratorium, which includes more than a dozen Latin American countries, several African states and Catholic countries opposed to abortion.The committee was due to vote on a final text on Thursday and, if passed, it could go to the full assembly in December.Two similar moves in the 1990s failed in the 192-member assembly, whose resolutions are non-binding but carry moral authority. This time, the text of the resolution stops short of an outright demand for immediate abolition.Instead, the draft calls for "a moratorium on executions with a view to abolishing the death penalty."China, Iran, Iraq, the United States, Pakistan and Sudan account for about 90 percent of all executions worldwide.As in the days of Noah...
