the essential
This Saturday, several hundred demonstrators gathered across France to defend the right to access to abortion, on the occasion of International Day for the Right to Abortion.
“The right to choose is vital.” In a climate of concern and vigilance six months after the inclusion of abortion in the Constitution, hundreds of people demonstrated on Saturday in Paris and in several French cities to defend the right to abortion. On the occasion of the international day dedicated to this right which remains hampered or even absent in certain countries, the procession set off in the capital, at the call of the collective “Abortion in Europe, women decide”, bringing together feminist associations and unions. “
I had an abortion two years ago,” “I almost died,” Marie Chureau, a 22-year-old student, told AFP. “The inclusion of abortion in the Constitution is not enough, it’s a freedom but not a right,” she explains in the Parisian demonstration, whose head banner proclaims: “Abortion is a fundamental right.”
The text of the call to demonstrate is concerned that the conditions of the “guaranteed freedom” of access to abortion enshrined in the Constitution in March could be “reduced downwards”, a first in the world. Thomas Laurent, 44, an entertainment worker wearing a CGT pin, believes that this registration “will not prevent the abolition of State Medical Aid” which guarantees certain free care to foreigners under certain conditions. in an irregular situation. “A reason for concern” because “undocumented women will no longer have access to gynecological care and abortion,” he says.
The right to abortion, definitively acquired?
This fear is reflected in the multiplication of signs saying “Don’t touch AME” and “the right to health, with or without papers”, in a procession mainly female and young. Bringing together several hundred people, the Toulouse gathering was joined by environmentalist MP Sandrine Rousseau. “We see that there are plenty of countries in which abortion rights are declining because with the rise of the extreme right, abortion rights are declining,” she declared to the AFP.
This demonstration means “that we are aware of the fact that it is a right which can be called into question at any time and that we will not give up”, she warned, noting the entry into government of Michel Barnier of “rare deputies and senators” who “voted against the constitutionalization of abortion”, like Annie Genevard and Bruno Retailleau.
“People think” that the right to abortion is “acquired” underlines Patricia Barango, 36 years old, qualified to become an emotional and sexual life educator. But “there are other countries in Europe where they have reversed the right to abortion, notably in Poland, but also in certain states of the United States. So no, it is not an acquired right” . “With this very conservative government”, with the threats of the arrival, perhaps soon, of the extreme right, it seems extremely important to us to remember that abortion is a right that must always be defended” , declared to AFP Valérie Radix, 54, member of the family planning of the Rights of Women of the Rhône collective in the Lyon demonstration.
In Lille, where around 150 people demonstrated, the “resignation of parliamentarians who voted against abortion in the constitution” in March was demanded, in a gathering where signs proclaimed “you don’t want me to abort so castrate -you”, or “the right to choose is vital”.
Prime Minister Michel Barnier assured that “acquired rights”, particularly in matters of abortion, would be “fully preserved”.
