Cloning: U.N. Debate Centers On Total Ban Or Allowance For Research
By Jim Wurst,
UN Wire
| 02. 28. 2002
Delegates began talks this week on a convention banning human
cloning, with general agreement that cloning to produce babies
should be totally prohibited, but sharp divisions on whether
cloning for scientific and medical research should be permitted.
The name of the committee handling the negotiations, the Ad
Hoc Committee on an International Convention Against the Reproductive
Cloning of Human Beings, indicates that a certain premise for
the negotiations is already settled. According to Christian
Much, the head of the German delegation to the talks, "the
real fundamental issue" is whether the ban should be total
or if allowances should be made for scientific research, such
as stem cell research.
Proposals to ban human reproductive cloning were first submitted
by Germany and France last August. Much said the negotiations
should be based on "pragmatism."
"You should not hold one good idea hostage to a second
good idea where there is no agreement," he told UN Wire.
"We should do what we can do now and agree on the one thing
on which we all agree, banning reproductive cloning."
"The starting point...
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