US Should Oust Brunei from TPP Over 'Taliban-like' Penal Code, Say Women's Groups
The Obama administration should remove Brunei from Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations, or halt the talks all together, over the announcement of a “new Taliban-like Brunei penal code,” said 12 women’s rights organizations in a June 6 letter to President Barack Obama. The penal code will phase-in punishments that include stricter consequences for adultery and theft, media reports say (here). The new laws will also punish women for wearing “indecent clothing,” becoming pregnant outside of marriage and having abortions, said the Feminist Majority Foundation in the letter.
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The administration hails TPP as a 21st century, highly ambitious agreement. Such an agreement should include fundamental human rights protections, said the foundation. The brokering of a TPP agreement will prevent the U.S. from imposing economic sanctions on Brunei in response to “discriminatory” policies, the letter added. “Whatever one thinks about the merits of the TPP, it is simply unacceptable for the United States to bind itself into a close and enduring relationship with a country that is enacting such policies,” said the letter. “That Brunei would opt to enact such policies during its fifth year of TPP negotiations with the United States and ten other Pacific Rim nation governments raises serious questions about both U.S. relations with Brunei and the TPP.”
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