A/HRC/24/22 moment of conception, even in cases of unexpected pregnancies. It was recommended that States should initiate policies that promoted respect for the right to life of every individual from conception to natural death and start campaigns to promote awareness to protect human life at every stage. Sexual and reproductive rights should thus not be defined as including the right to abortion. States should invest in providing better health care and prenatal health care to women. 54. Fundación Tekota, Mexico, underlined the essential value of people and family and referred to its work to promote a culture of peace, and the values of life and family, fundamental elements of society. 55. Global Helping to Advance Women and Children stated that the Human Rights Council Advisory Committee should make more effort to identify traditional values which were common to all cultures and civilizations, and stressed their role in developing and promoting human rights. It drew attention to two universal traditional values that had not been sufficiently raised in the preliminary study – the family as the natural and fundamental group unit of society, and the prior right of parents to choose the kind of education to be given to their children. 56. The Advisory Committee should highlight the positive linkages between protecting the family, protecting parental rights and the dignity, welfare and rights of children. It should identify appropriate positive measures to help States strengthen the role of the family in promoting respect for human rights. 57. Human Life International, Guatemala, found that traditional values were common to all mankind and were necessary to effectively protect universal human rights. It was necessary to protect the family and the right to life from the moment of conception until natural death as these were the most fundamental and universal human rights. The family, the foundation of society and traditional values provided the basis for peaceful coexistence, true integration and social cohesion. 58. Human Life International and the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children stated that the Human Rights Council resolution calling for the present report engendered controversy stemming from semantic and philosophical issues. The resolution suggested a strategy which was pragmatic and applicable to a broad spectrum of beliefs, provided a useful methodology for recognition of universal rights to diminish conflict and partisanship. 59. It was proposed that values were the understanding and the promotion of what was good or inherently good rather than specific customs and practices which may become codified or appear as traditions. While values are universal to humankind, those which might violate human rights were not acceptable to humankind as a whole. Traditional values were therefore to be defined as “good things” enduring in the nature of people and independent of political or social structures. That clarified the assertion that traditional values underpinned human rights. 60. Human Rights Watch, United Kingdom, criticized the concept of the universality of human rights and values imposed upon the rest of the world by particular States or coalitions of States, especially in the context of the invasion of Iraq and the alleged global war on terror. It appreciated the notion of “traditional values of humankind” as that connected human rights to the broader context of humanitarianism reflecting the values of goodness, empathy, respect, care, mutual support, tolerance and trust. Those values were the entry point for a human rights discourse to evolve but without the immediate reliance upon a concept of rights and obligations to protect and reliance upon economic indicators or real coercion. Reference was made to the role of civil society in all communities or States which sought to endorse and live by the fundamental values of humankind. 12