Tears ahead of Argentina abortion bill

WITH Argentina on the verge of a Senate move on legalising abortion, women in favour marched, banged pots and made their voices heard on Sunday.

Ahead of Wednesday’s Senate hearing, 32 women in Buenos Aires donned the white bonnets and red cloaks worn by women forced into childbearing servitude on the television drama TheHandmaid’sTale based on Margaret Atwood’s dystopian novel.

At the Rio de la Plata, they also raised their green handkerchiefs, a symbol of the struggle for legal abortion.

It is a thorny issue in Argentina – which is mostly Roman Catholic and the home country of Pope Francis, the first pontiff born in Latin America. Many in the country believe the church teaching that life begins at conception and that abortion is murder.

“Doing this helps us express what is not being heard – which is that abortions happen. And we need them to be done in a safe place, open to the community, to all women,” Bernardina Rossini, one of the marchers, said.

The women embraced, and several wept openly. Most were between 30 and 60 years old.

“It’s a way of saying this: it’s our body, and we want to decide on what happens ourselves,” Rossini stressed.

Approved by Congress’ lower house on June 14, the bill sent to the Senate would legalise abortion in the first 14 weeks of pregnancy.