Showdown in Cairo

(2 of 3)
The Vatican's opposition was predictable, but not its alliance with many Muslim leaders. Seeking support for the Pope's stand against the conference, his envoys met this summer with leaders from several Muslim countries, including Iran and Libya. The envoys got cordial receptions because the . followers of Islam, besides having rigid ideas about the role of women, generally disapprove of abortion. It's not clear how many nations will join the Catholic-Muslim opposition in Cairo, but the conference is sure to be a contentious affair. Particularly unsettling is the possibility of violent protests. Over the past two years, Muslim extremists in Egypt have stepped up efforts to overthrow Mubarak's pro-Western government, and terrorist attacks have killed more than 390 people, including five foreigners.

It will be a tragedy if dissension undermines the crucial work of the conference: to reach some agreement on how to slow down the population juggernaut. The number of humans now totals 5.7 billion, is growing by 94 million annually, and could reach 10 billion by the year 2050 unless population control -- or famine, warfare and disease -- intervenes. Already, population pressures are magnifying the human misery caused by every war, political upheaval or natural disaster, from Rwanda and Somalia to Haiti and Cuba. Relief agencies equipped to handle thousands of dislocated or starving people every few years must now cope with millions of dispossessed souls clamoring for help in several different places at once.

Optimists have argued that naturally declining birthrates could defuse the population bomb. But the world's head count has grown so large that even a modest birthrate will produce huge increases. Consider the case of China, where a draconian birth-control program has reduced the country's annual population-growth rate to 1.4%, the same as Canada's. Since China already has 1.2 billion people, however, the country grows by 17 million -- half a Canada -- each year. Lester Brown of Washington's Worldwatch Institute wonders where the food will come from to feed the 300 million Chinese who will be added during the next 30 years. He points out that by the year 2030, China could consume all the surplus grain produced in the world today merely to meet the basic needs of its population.

The implications of such grim arithmetic are not lost on anyone, not even the dissenters who are trying to derail the proceedings in Cairo. In Iran, where some officials have endorsed the Vatican's opposition to the conference, the government has for years pushed family planning. And the Vatican's own scientific advisory panel has warned that an unchecked tide of humanity poses a threat to the planet.

But that has not prevented the Catholic-Muslim alliance from objecting strenuously to the U.N.'s proposed solutions. The Pope thinks the plan embodies a vision of sexuality that favors the individual over the family. "Today," he said, "it is more urgent than ever to react against models of behavior that are the fruit of a hedonistic and permissive culture." Islamic intellectual Mustafa Mahmoud of Egypt calls the draft plan "a well- designed explosive device to blow apart ((Muslim)) religious identity."