August 23, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Three of the GOP’s presidential candidates have criticized Vice President Joe Biden for his remarks in China this weekend appearing to condone the country’s coercive population control policy.
Biden had referred to the economic disadvantage of the policy while dismissing it as something he wouldn’t otherwise question. “Your policy has been one which I fully understand – I’m not second-guessing – of one child per family,” he said.
The remark drew ire from human rights advocates who pointed to the thousands of Chinese women victimized by forced abortions and sterilizations each day under draconian population control enforcement in the communist country.
Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, who has remained at or near the top of the GOP race, said that Biden “should have condemned [the one-child policy] in the strongest possible terms,” instead of condoning it.
“There can be no defense of a government that engages in compulsory sterilization and forced abortions in the name of population control,” said Romney in a statement picked up by Politico.
Another statement came from Texas governor Rick Perry, the more strongly pro-life foil to frontrunner Romney, who has a shaky record on life issues.
“China’s one child policy has led to the great human tragedy of forced abortions throughout China, and Vice President Biden’s refusal to ‘second-guess’ this horrendous policy demonstrates great moral indifference on the part of the Obama Administration,” said Perry.
“Americans value life, and we deserve leaders who will stand up against such inhumanity, not cast a blind eye.”
Former Utah governor Jon Huntsman, another GOP candidate who until recently served as Obama’s U.S. ambassador to China, also weighed in on an issue close to his home turf.
“As an adoptive father, whose daughter was abandoned by her parents in China, Governor Huntsman is intimately familiar with the impact of China’s ‘one-child’ policy,” stated Huntsman’s campaign. “As someone who is firmly pro-life, he feels the policy runs counter to the fundamental value of human life and is heartbroken by the destructive nature of the policy that has cost millions of lives.”