AMERICA/COSTA RICA - Bishops say Budapest Treaty: "must be interpreted according to Costa Rican law so as to respect the dignity of the human person or the inviolable right to life "

San José (Agenzia Fides) - The Catholic Bishops of Costa Rica have expressed concern with regard to the Budapest Treaty and the approval of a Bill entitled "Costa Rica joins the Budapest Treaty on the International Recognition of the Deposit of Microorganisms for the Purposes of Patent Procedure".
In a statement the Catholic Bishops' Conference said the Budapest Treaty, "the fact that the treaty does not specify that gametes and human embryos are excluded from the term ‘microorganisms’, could be seen now or in the future that they are included in the term and this would violate the dignity and rights of the human person".
For the Bishops "when the object of technical manipulation is the human being, analysis must go beyond the ‘technically correct’ level. What must prevail is the ethical criteria which inspires documents of Human Rights signed by our country: the human being cannot be treated as a means". Since the law in Costa Rica respects human life from conception to natural death, acknowledging that the embryo is not an object but a person “to be protected as any other human person”.
The Bishops demand that if the Bill on the Budapest Treaty is approved "it must be interpreted according to Costa Rican law so as to respect the dignity of the human person or the inviolable right to life ". They call on members of parliament to guarantee in the Constitution "that no human being of any age or under any circumstance, may be treated in a way as to harm his or her dignity or rights ". (RG) (Agenzia Fides 28/11/2007; righe 22, parole 293)