UN asked to recognize surrogate motherhood as a new form of slavery
A coalition of experts from the Casablanca group and the French NGO Juristes Pour l’Enfance has petitioned the United Nations to classify surrogacy as a new form of slavery under the 1926 Slavery Convention. The petition argues that surrogacy treats unborn children as disposable objects and subjects surrogate mothers to the control of third parties, thereby meeting the legal definition of ownership. The request follows previous UN findings that equate commercial surrogacy with the sale of children and calls for a universal moratorium and eventual abolition of the practice. Pope Francis has also condemned surrogacy as a grave violation of human dignity, urging the international community to prohibit it worldwide.
16 days ago
The Casablanca Group of Experts and French NGO Juristes Pour l’Enfance have asked a U.N. special rapporteur to classify surrogacy as “a new form of slavery involving women and children.” Their submission argues that surrogacy can involve control over the pregnant woman and treating the child as an object subject to contractual disposal.
The request was submitted to Katarina Schwarz, the U.N. special rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery and human trafficking. It coincides with the centennial of the 1926 Slavery Convention and an upcoming Human Rights Council session addressing contemporary forms of slavery.
The groups are asking Schwarz to encourage states to end surrogacy within their territories and commit to its universal abolition. The submission is presented as a request for recognition and action, rather than as an existing U.N. determination that surrogacy legally constitutes slavery.
The petitioners contend that surrogacy falls within the 1926 convention’s concept of slavery: the exercise of powers associated with ownership over a person. They argue that contractual arrangements can reduce the child in utero to an object that may be accepted, rejected, or otherwise disposed of by intended parents or other parties.
Regarding the surrogate mother, the groups say that third parties may exercise control over her body and pregnancy, including her diet, medical treatment, embryo reduction, and abortion.
The Casablanca Group and Juristes Pour l’Enfance cite earlier U.N. positions that they say support their case. These include a 2018 statement by the special rapporteur on the sale of children and a 2019 position by the Committee on the Rights of the Child, both of which the groups characterize as identifying forms of surrogacy with the sale of children.
They also point to a July 2025 report by the special rapporteur on violence against women and girls, which called for the eradication of all forms of surrogacy and a binding international instrument to abolish the practice. In addition, a joint statement by states issued June 22, 2026, called for an international moratorium as a step toward universal abolition.
The article says the Catholic Church also opposes surrogacy. In a 2024 address to diplomats accredited to the Holy See, Pope Francis called the practice “deplorable” and described it as a serious violation of the dignity of both the woman and the child, particularly when it exploits a mother’s material hardship.
Francis stated that a child should be regarded as a gift rather than the subject of a commercial contract and urged the international community to prohibit surrogacy universally.
Surrogacy violates human dignity; should be prohibited by Catholic teaching
Yes. Catholic teaching holds that surrogacy should be prohibited because it violates the dignity of both the child and the woman.
Therefore, Dignitas Infinita describes surrogacy as a grave violation of human dignity and records Pope Francis’s hope that the international community will prohibit it universally. Catholic health-care institutions are consequently forbidden to participate in surrogate-motherhood arrangements.
This prohibition is not a judgment against children born through surrogacy, nor does it deny the suffering of infertile couples. Rather, it rejects a reproductive system that commodifies motherhood and the child while seeking to protect the inherent dignity of everyone involved.