New York - Negotiators hammering out a UN plan to improve women's lives wrangled over sexual rights and the handling of domestic violence yesterday in the waning hours of a five-day global conference. The conference was trying to reach consensus on a document based on a previous pivotal women's conference in Beijing five years ago.
Women's health and human rights advocates have complained that the Vatican, Pakistan, Iran, Libya, Algeria and Nicaragua have tried to erode strong positions in the Beijing document. In response Catholic groups accused the West of trying to put radical concepts into a new document that were not contained in the Beijing platform.