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OTTAWA, Ontario, September 23, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – After a leaked report Thursday morning indicated that Canada was about to refund the International Planned Parenthood Federation, the Canadian government has confirmed that they awarded a grant late Thursday to the abortion organization, the world’s largest abortion provider.

“Late yesterday, International Planned Parenthood Federation was informed that its application for funding has been approved under the Maternal, Newborns and Child Health commitment,” Justin Broekema, press secretary for Minister of International Cooperation Bev Oda, told LifeSiteNews Friday.

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The statement confirms a CBC report from Thursday morning, which revealed that IPPF will receive $6 million over the next three years towards work related to sex education and contraception in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Mali, Sudan, and Tanzania.

IPPF had not received funding from Canada since the end of 2009 after a petition campaign by Saskatchewan MP Brad Trost.

Trost told LifeSiteNews Friday that he stands by his previous statements on the issue and will be releasing a more detailed statement sometime next week.  “My views, my position, my stance has not wavered one inch,” he said.

During the election season in April, Trost publicly announced that Planned Parenthood was “defunded,” and said it was an “absolute disgrace” that Planned Parenthood would get even “one penny of Canadian taxpayers dollars.”

International Cooperation Minister Bev Oda responded by saying that IPPF would receive funding if the application met their criteria under the government’s G8 maternal and child health initiative.  “If Planned Parenthood submits an application that falls within the government’s parameters for the G8 Muskoka Initiative, there will be funding,” she said in a statement.

After launching its maternal health initiative in 2010, Prime Minister Stephen Harper pledged that the initiative would not include funding for abortion.

To justify its funding to the world’s largest abortion provider, the government has restricted the funds to countries where abortion is illegal or highly restricted.

But advocacy for legal abortion is central to IPPF’s mission, and the organization is open about the fact it pushes for abortion in those countries where it is currently illegal.

“We believe that a woman has the right to choose and access safe abortion services and we lobby for changes in legislation to support this,” they write on their website.

“Safe abortion is one of the priority concerns of our work,” they note, pointing out that they have recently made “an important commitment to scale up our work on abortion.”

“The first step is to initiate discussion to help remove stigma, as well as cultural and religious prejudices against abortion,” they explain.

IPPF’s affiliate in Tanzania, called UMATI, says they have been “at the forefront in advocating for [sexual and reproductive health] rights such as safe abortion.”  And the affiliate in Mali, called the Association Malienne pour la Protection et la Promotion de la Famille, works with a lobby group called the International Consortium for Medical Abortion.

“You’d think that the government would have smartened up by now about giving money to this organization, whose sole purpose is to kill human beings, especially those in Third World countries,” said Jim Hughes, national president of Campaign Life Coalition.

“The government claims that the money is going only to countries where abortion isn’t legal, and it’s not going to be used for abortion, but knowing IPPF, which pocket you put it in doesn’t matter,” he continued.  “It just frees up other monies to go along with the baby-killing.”

“I can’t imagine why they would stoop to this,” he added.  “They’re not going to gain anything for it, and they’re going to lose a whole hell of a lot.”

Contact Information:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper
80 Wellington Street
Ottawa, ON
K1A 0A2
Fax: 613-941-6900
E-mail: [email protected]

Bev Oda, MP (Durham) and Minister of International Cooperation
House of Commons
Ottawa, ON
K1A 0A6
Phone: (613) 992-2792
Fax: (613) 992-2794
Email: [email protected]

Brad Trost, MP (Saskatoon-Humboldt)
505B Nelson Road
Saskatoon, SK S7S 1P4
Phone: (306) 975-6133
Toll Free: (866) 797-6133
Fax: (306) 975-6670
E-mail: [email protected]