UNITED NATIONS, Oct 29 (AFP) - After Iraq and the Middle East, the United Nations is now divided again over another life-and-death question -- whether human beings should be cloned in the name of medical research.
Supporters say limited cloning could help treat killer diseases like AIDS while opponents argue the freedom to manufacture embryos in a laboratory opens an ethical minefield on the cutting edge of modern science.
The two competing visions will face off as early as this week if backers of "therapeutic cloning" push a vote in the UN General Assembly that will spell out society's willingness to take the task of creation into its own hands.
Costa Rica, the United States, the Philippines and more than 50 other nations, backed by the Vatican, want a worldwide convention banning all forms of human cloning by next year.
Their proposal says the cloning of human beings is "morally repugnant, unethical and contrary to respect for the person and constitutes a grave violation of fundamental human rights."
Lined up against them are Belgium, Britain, China and a sizeable minority of other nations which believe limited cloning "opens up prospects for the improvement of the health of individuals and mankind as a whole."
Supporters of therapeutic cloning say their proposal safeguards the sanctity of human life but gives countries the latitude to police themselves and decide individually where the boundaries should lie.
"While respecting the position of those countries which are opposed, it also allows others to continue with a strictly regulated position," one UN diplomat who backs the Belgian proposal told AFP.
"As it stands now, in states where there isn't any legislation at all, a reproductively cloned child could be born tomorrow and nobody could do a thing about it," he said.
But the limitations set out in that proposal aren't strong enough for those in favour of a total ban, who argue that allowing society to create human beings at will opens a Pandora's box of untold problems.
"This isn't just a moral issue," said a Philippine diplomat. "It has commercial, social and economic implications. Where would you get these cloned embryos? Wouldn't you look to marginalised and impoverished countries?"
The pro-cloning diplomat dismissed the economic argument.
"This would ultimately be to the benefit of less developed countries if, for example, it lead to developments in the treatment of HIV and AIDS which inordinately affect poorer nations," he said.
Unlike those approved by the UN Security Council, resolutions passed by the General Assembly are not legally binding but do represent the trend of world opinion, and could set the tone for future legal debate.
US officials are adamant there is no possibility of compromise. "In diplomacy you never like to say there's no room for discussion but on this one, it seems pretty black-and-white," one said.
Diplomats said they expect a decision by Monday at the latest on whether the supporters of the Costa Rica resolution will demand an assembly vote or abandon the initiative for now.
The measure would likely pass but amid so much opposition, they said, a resolution with only partial support would further weaken the UN at a time when its credibility and influence on the world stage are in question.
"This is the farce," one diplomat said. "You'd be entering into a convention knowing that a substantial body of world opinion doesn't support it. It would be a fairly worthless convention -- but then it wouldn't be the first one."
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