EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT COMMITTEE ON WOMEN PASSES PRO-ABORTION REPORT

STRASBOURG, June 6, 2002 (LSN.ca) – LifeSite has learned that the Women’s Commission of the European Parliament voted Tuesday to adopt a document calling all member nations to provide abortion.  The Commission for the Rights of Women and Equality of Opportunities voted 21-11 to adopt the report written for the Women’s Commission by Anne E. M. Van Lancker, an MEP of the socialist party from Belgium. The report will be voted on by the full European Parliament in Strasbourg next month.  The European pro-life group Euro-Fam notes that the document suggests that the expansion of sex education in all European schools and the introduction of contraception programmes by public health systems (including the provision of so-called emergency contraception or the morning-after pill) would lower the abortion rate, especially in European Union candidate countries. This is despite the fact that statistical evidence suggests a contrary trend in member states of the EU.  Van Lancker’s report affirms (in point no.9) that all EU member states and candidate countries should make abortion legal and accessible to all women. This is to say that abortion should also be free. Sex education and access to contraception, including so-called emergency contraception, should be legal and be made available to adolescents without the knowledge of their parents.  Euro-Fam warns that “the principles established in this document run the risk of imposing on EU candidate countries as conditions for entry policies on abortion that are absolutely outside of the competency of the Community.”  See the Euro-Fam coverage:  https://www.euro-fam.org/eurunion/eu-parl/actions2002/2002-06-RR/A.php?LG=EN