Nearly 94,000 citizens signed a citizens’ initiative to remove abortion from criminal law, more than double those needed for it to be placed on the agenda of the House of Representatives.
The citizens’ initiative, carried out by BNNVARA and NGO Humanistisch Verbond, called on the House of Representatives to remove abortion from Dutch criminal law.
According to BNNVARA presenter Dzifa Kusenuh, abortion should be removed from criminal law because it contributes to the taboo surrounding the topic.
She also added that, in the Netherlands, the anti-abortion lobby is getting “better organised and also cooperates a great deal with other countries in Europe such as Poland and Hungary” (countries with strict abortion regulations). “I think we should be on our guard,” she told De Nieuws BV, NL Times reported.
On 14 November, the Democrats 66, a coalition member, announced that wanted the Netherlands to promote abortion as a right on an international scale, saying that this would be possible if access to abortion is declared a human right in the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights.
In July, MEPs demanded that abortion be included in the Charter of Fundamental Rights as “everyone has the right to safe and legal abortion.”
(Sofia Stuart Leeson | EURACTIV.com)
Source: euractiv.com
