El Salvador’s Draconian Abortion Laws: a Miscarriage of Justice

[Judi Lynn]

July 28, 2015
El Salvador’s Draconian Abortion Laws: a Miscarriage of Justice

by Michael Avender - Medea Benjamin

“We are here to speak for them, to call for their release. When there is an injustice, silence is complicity,” said Father Roy Bourgeois, founder of School of the Americas Watch and a decades-long advocate for human rights in Latin America. He was referring to the 17 women, known as Las 17, who are currently serving 30-year sentences in prison for having miscarriages in El Salvador.

Father Roy Bourgeois is one of the six human rights activists who staged a sit-in at the Salvadoran Embassy in Washington, DC on April 24, 2015 calling for the release of the women. Four of the protesters were arrested by the Secret Service.

“It was an honor to go to the embassy and be arrested in solidarity with the women in El Salvador” said Father Bourgeois. “Our greatest enemy in the United States is ignorance, so our job is to tell the stories.”

An overwhelming number of women in El Salvador–particularly poor, unmarried, uneducated women–face outrageous human rights violations as they are denied autonomy over their bodies. El Salvador has one of the strictest and most archaic anti-abortion laws in the world; it has a total ban on abortion, even in cases of rape, incest, and medical emergencies. Women who have miscarriages or stillborn births are confronted with suspicion from authorities. The legal system has an built-in “presumption of guilt,” making it virtually impossible for women to prove their innocence. Instead, these women are charged with manslaughter and imprisoned. All too often Salvadoran women are forced to live a life of overwhelming stigmatization and marginalization.

More:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/07/28/salvadors-draconian-abortion-laws-a-miscarriage-of-justice/

[FrodosPet]

1. Venezuela isn't much better regarding abortion

http://caracaschronicles.com/2014/06/23/abortion-in-venezuela-two-opinions/

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Since 1915, abortion has been illegal in Venezuela, with the only exception if the mother’s life is at risk from the pregnancy (no, you cannot even access a legal abortion if you are pregnant due to rape).

Even so, about 60,000 illegal abortions are estimated to be performed each year in our country. This number shouldn’t surprise us, considering that 50% of Venezuelan pregnancies are unintended. And unintended pregnancies are the root of abortions.

In 2006 an incredible 43,16% of the cases admitted in Maternidad Concepcion Palacios (the nation’s biggest maternity) were of women with ongoing voluntary abortion procedures. Twenty of those women died.

Nationwide, every week two women die during or from complications from this procedure. In 2009, it still was the third cause of death of pregnant mothers (Venezuela has the highest maternity death rate in all Latin America by the way).

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