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Conservatives in US Senate oppose disability treaty

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Businessman signing contract from Shutterstock
Businessman signing contract from Shutterstock
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A US Senate committee voted on Tuesday to advance a UN treaty to protect people with disabilities from discrimination, but the agreement faces a tough fight winning the two-thirds majority needed for ratification by the full Senate.

Although 146 nations and the European Union have ratified the United Nations convention, it has failed to win approval in the deeply divided US Senate, where many conservatives are wary of subjecting American social policies to global laws.

Read: Discrimination increases obesity risk

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted 12-6 in favour of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Only two Republicans, John McCain of Arizona and John Barrasso of Wyoming, joined the panel's 10 Democrats in favour.

The treaty is supported by leading US military veterans' organisations, advocates for the rights of people with disabilities and business groups.

Divisive social issues

Opponents, including many socially conservative Republicans, worry it could expand abortion rights, threaten US parental rights such as the ability to home-school children and shift power to the federal government from US states.

Read: Home-schooled kids leaner than peers

The treaty's backers dismissed those concerns and accused opponents of injecting divisive social issues into the debate to score political points.

"It is so wrong to the disabled people to catch them up in this debate," California Democratic Senator Barbara Boxer said during heated discussions in the committee meeting.

Backers said the agreement would face stiff resistance winning the 67 votes it would need to be ratified by the full 100-member Senate, where Republicans hold 45 seats.

Fundamental issue of human rights


The treaty was defeated by just five votes in the Senate in 2012. McCain, a war veteran and strong advocate for the treaty, said: "We won't quit on this issue because we believe it is a fundamental issue of human rights."

Read: Happy humans know their rights

To press the issue, McCain and other treaty backers scheduled a news conference on Wednesday with representatives of veterans' organisations, including the American Legion and Vietnam Veterans of America, and former Kansas Senator Bob Dole, a wounded war veteran who has championed the international accord.

Dole, now 91, was badly injured while fighting in World War Two, but went on to a long career in public office that included stints as Senate Majority leader and the 1996 Republican presidential nomination.

He watched from a wheelchair in the Senate in 2012 as members voted against ratification.

Read more:

Can extreme obesity be considered a disability?
Nokhwezi on stigma and discrimination
The realities of disability



Image: Businessman signing contract from Shutterstock

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