Pickling routines accessible through the C API?

I would like to call Python's pickling routines (dumps and loads) from within c++ code. Are they exposed in the official API? I am currently calling those via boost::python from c++, looking for a simpler way perhaps.

Many years later, not quite answering the question, and based on Martijn Pieters' answer, here is a drop in replacement for Marshal:

static PyObject * PyPickle=NULL;
static PyObject * pDumps=NULL;
static PyObject * pLoads=NULL;

static void init_pickle()
{
    if(!pDumps)
        pDumps = PyUnicode_FromString("dumps");
    if(!pLoads)
        pLoads = PyUnicode_FromString("loads");

    if(!PyPickle)
        PyPickle = PyImport_ImportModule("pickle");
}

static PyObject *PyPickle_ReadObjectFromString(const char *data, Py_ssize_t len)
{
    PyObject *pstr = PyBytes_FromStringAndSize(data, len);
    PyObject *ret=NULL;

    ret = PyObject_CallMethodOneArg(PyPickle, pLoads, pstr);
    Py_XDECREF(pstr);

    return ret;
}

static PyObject *PyPickle_WriteObjectToString(PyObject *value, int version)
{
    //version currently ignored
    return PyObject_CallMethodOneArg(PyPickle, pDumps, value);
}

Perhaps someone will find it useful.