France has officially included the right to abortion in its constitution and has become the world’s first country to do so. French President Emmanuel Macron said France would not rest until the right to abortion was guaranteed in the EU’s rights charter.
Paris: France has officially included the right to abortion in its constitution, making it the first country in the world to do so. French President Emmanuel Macron said that the country would not rest until the right to abortion was guaranteed in the EU’s rights charter, Al Jazeera. Reported. The constitutional amendment was sealed with a hot wax to formally inscribe the right to terminate a pregnancy. The amendment received approval form the French Parliament earlier this week.
“Today is not the end of the story but the start of a fight. We’re going to lead this fight in our continent, in our Europe, where reactionary forces are attacking women’s rights,” President Macron said, standing in front of the Ministry of Justice.
Although abortion has been legal in France since 1975, Macron promised last year to strengthen protections for the operation after the US Supreme Court struck down the 50-year-old right to procedure in 2022, leaving state-level decisions intact, as per Al Jazeera.
Women celebrated on Monday after a historic vote in both houses of the French Parliament approved the inclusion of abortion as a “guaranteed freedom” under Article 34 of the constitution.
According to CNN, while abortion is a highly divisive issue in US politics that often falls along party lines, in France it is widely supported. Many of the lawmakers who voted against the amendment did so not because they opposed abortion, but because they felt the measure was unnecessary, given the wide support for reproductive rights.
