By Hilary White
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SAN JOSÉ, May 30, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The Spanish language news agency, Notivida reports that the Supreme Court of Costa Rica has ruled the whole concept of “gay marriage” unconstitutional. The suit was brought in 2003 by lawyer Yashin Castrillo Fernandez who argued that the state must comply with international agreements on human rights. The argument was rejected by the court 5-2.
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The Court ruled, “the concept of marriage embraced by the political constitution stems historically from a context where it is understood to be between a man and a woman.”
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Chief Justice Luis Fernando Solano said the problem could be solved by legislation allowing homosexuals to form “civil unions.”
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Efforts have been underway by numerous international groups for some time to shift Costa Rica’s social policies to the left. UN organization, Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), has been especially active in pushing for legalized abortion and the usual programs of sex education and contraception under the auspices of “reproductive health” and women’s rights.
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Costa Rica, a country where over three quarters of the population is Catholic, has been withstanding efforts to impose the sexual libertinism philosophies. In 2002, Costa Rican President Abel Pacheco gave a firm “no” to then-UN High Commissioner for Human, Rights Mary Robinson, an avowed activist for most radical feminist and leftist causes. Robinson had visited him at his hotel demanding he support language in the Earth Summit document that might have opened the door to legalized abortion.
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In 2000, the Costa Rican Supreme Court ruled that the practice of in vitro fertilization is also unconstitutional, writing that according to the constitution, “The human embryo is a person from the moment of conception … not an object … not to be frozen … (and that it is) not constitutionally legitimate to be exposed to a disproportionate risk of death.”
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Steady pressure continues, however. Last year the New York based abortion advocacy organization, the Center for Reproductive Rights brought suit against the Costa Rican government insisting that the ban on IVF be withdrawn.
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The Center, one of the more prominent organizations working to impose the sexual revolution in Latin America, said that overturning the Costa Rican ban would have major repercussions for laws regarding IVF all over North and South America.