| Press Statement Richard Boucher, Spokesman Washington, DC July 22, 2002 FY 2002 Funding for the UN Population Fund (UNFPA)The Foreign Operations, Export Financing and Related Programs Appropriations Act for fiscal year 2002, Pub. L. 107-115 ("Act"), appropriates "not more than $34 million" for the UN Population Fund (UNFPA). The Act, like every foreign operations appropriations act since 1985, also provides that "none of the funds available in this Act…may be made available to any organization or program which, as determined by the President of the United States, supports or participates in the management of a program of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization." Authority to make determinations as to whether this funding restriction (known as the "Kemp-Kasten amendment") precludes funding organizations or programs has been delegated to the Secretary of State. The Secretary believes that the full $34 million appropriated by Congress should be used for the purpose of family planning and reproductive health as originally envisaged. Accordingly, because the Secretary has concluded that no funds made available by the Act may be provided to UNFPA at this time because of Kemp-Kasten, he is proposing to apply the full $34 million to USAID’s Child Survival and Health Program Fund to be used for family planning and reproductive health care activities. In coming to this conclusion, the Secretary relied on information made available to him, including briefings supplied by UNFPA, Chinese law, the State Department’s annual human rights reports, and the report of a three-member independent assessment team that traveled to China in May 2002 at his request. |
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