EU DECODED: Should access to abortion be harmonised within EU? - video Dailymotion

euronews (in English)

For more than 60 years, Europe has led a global trend towards legal access to abortion. Fears of a reversal of this trend have led to the campaign “My Choice, My Voice”, a citizens’ initiative calling for action from the European Commission.

Transcript

00:00For more than 60 years, Europe led the global trend towards legal access to abortion.

00:19But fears of a reverse of that trend led to a citizens' initiative calling for action

00:25from the European Commission.

00:27The abortion rights initiative My Choice, My Voice, hit one million signatures last

00:32December.

00:33Yuriko explains what this means on the ground here in Brussels.

00:38The Commission is now obliged to formally respond to the initiative's demand for a

00:42proposal to ensure that all EU citizens, regardless of nationality or residence, have access to

00:47safe and legal abortion services.

00:50In the EU, almost all countries have legalized abortion on request, on average up to 12 weeks

00:56of pregnancy.

00:57Poland and Malta are the only member states that maintain highly restrictive laws.

01:02In Poland, rape, incest and threat to the mother's life are the sole legal justifications

01:07for the procedure, but in Malta, only the latter.

01:11In some countries where abortion is legal on demand, doctors cite moral reasons for

01:17refusing.

01:18We asked Europeans whether abortion should be transferred from a national legislative

01:24competence to an EU competence.

01:54Marta Iraola is following this topic for Euronews.

02:12What answer can we expect from the European Commission to the My Choice, My Voice petition

02:17on abortion rights?

02:18Yes, so now that the initiative reached one million signatures and fulfilled all the minimum

02:25requirements, now the Commission is obliged to issue a response to the Citizens' Initiative.

02:31This means that the College of Commissioners will discuss the topic in one of their meetings

02:35and they will have to come up with something.

02:37This something can be a legislative proposal, a communication or just acknowledgement of

02:44the petition without taking it any further.

02:47In 2022, the United States repealed a law that legalized abortion at the federal level

02:5350 years earlier, giving now the states the right to decide.

02:57Since then, the European Parliament approved a resolution with a clear demand.

03:02What was that?

03:03In April last year, the European Parliament approved a non-binding resolution to enshrine

03:09abortion in the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights to make it legally binding across all

03:14the EU member states.

03:16However, this is not binding, it's just a symbolic vote, let's say.

03:22And what can we expect from the member states regarding any proposals that are coming from

03:27the Commission and the European Parliament?

03:30If in the end they end up presenting something, a legislative proposal from this initiative,

03:35then it will go to the Council and will be discussed among EU ministers.

03:40However, it is true that the Commission could decide to address abortion through the cross-border

03:47health care directive, which is a directive that allows citizens to seek medical services

03:52across countries within the EU borders.

03:56The 2022 World Health Organization guidelines state that women should not face extra barriers

04:01to request for abortion when they respect the legal time frame.

04:06But in nine EU countries, the law requires women to take a few days of reflection after

04:11submitting the application, including Germany and Portugal.

04:15There is also mandatory counseling by staff in seven member states, such as Hungary and

04:20Italy.

04:21In others, doctors refuse to perform abortions on grounds of conscience, leading women to

04:26have abortions in unsafe places or having to travel to other places.

04:30By contrast, France was the first country in the world to enshrine abortion in the Constitution

04:35last year.

05:05EU countries are very different, because the EU does not have a health competence as such,

05:14it has a support competence, the principle of subsidiarity, that is, if the country has

05:19resources to provide such measures, the EU does not intervene.

05:25The access to abortion, in fact, for the activists and experts of the question, it must be considered

05:40as a fundamental right, because we realize that access to abortion will condition the

05:47exercise of women to their fundamental rights, in particular the right to life, to health,

05:54the right not to be subjected to violence, discrimination, inhumane, degrading treatment, etc.

06:00And, in fact, we see that in countries where abortion is practically forbidden, women

06:07are subjected to great violence.

06:09There is no safe abortion, there is no safe abortion and there is no healthy abortion.

06:14Abortion does not cure any disease.

06:17I would like to open a debate, because if it is a measure that implies violence for the

06:27son or daughter, and that puts the mother at physical and psychological risk, if it is

06:35such a dangerous measure, why is it promoted instead of proposing other types of social

06:42measures, much more constructive and much safer for the mother?

06:54We hope that the legislation that is proposed by this European initiative will succeed,

07:01that the Commission adopts a law that creates this financial mechanism so that Member States

07:08can help women who must have access to abortion.

07:15It seems to me that if it is about financing, in some way, aid for this measure to be developed,

07:22it can incur fraud of the national law.

07:25On the other hand, I would expect from the European Commission a great gesture of closeness

07:30with women in a vulnerable situation, in a critical situation of pregnancy.

07:36Equality Commissioner Haja Labib has this portfolio within the European Union.

07:42When she went to the European Parliament for the first time, she said that it is unacceptable

07:47that there is not an equal access to abortion in all EU countries.

07:51But she also recognized that it will be very difficult to have unanimity from the countries

07:56on this topic.

EU DECODED: Should access to abortion be harmonised within EU?

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