EPSU joins Europe wide protests in support of Right to Abortion

(28 September 2017) Representatives of a large group of organisations will join in a demonstration in support of the right to abortion in Europe. 28 September is the International Day for Safe and Legal Abortion. Demands include:

  • Access to abortion is a right
  • Training in abortion procedures and accompaniment should be integral part of basic training of health professionals
  • Legal time limits for abortion should be brought into line with the most progressive in Europe.  Countries should go for complete decriminalization of abortion
  • Financial resources must be allocated so that the centres carrying out abortion and family planning centres are accessible everywhere. For the full list of demands www.avortementeurope.org

EPSU vice-president Francoise Geng will speak underlining the importance of the right to abortion, the importance of the appropriate training and procedures for health and other care professionals and how the attack on this right of women is part of a broader attack on social rights. She will be joined by the EPSU General Secretary. The EPSU Congress 2014 supported Spanish women standing up to the attacks on the right to abortion by the right wing conservative government. Weeks of action and strikes were undertaken by Polish women in 2016 when the conservative government sought to make the laws on abortion even stricter. The Irish women’s movement achieved a success and Ireland will hold a referendum on abortion in 2018.

The EPSU Executive Committee underlined its support for the Women’s movement and defending the right to abortion at its meeting in April 2017

The protest is organized in the European Quartier of Brussels. The representatives of EPSU will be joined by Belgian unions and the Women’s Committee of the ETUC amongst many others.

For more information

www.avortementeurope.org

www.marchemondialdesfemmes.be

  • EPSU GS and EPSU VP at the Women's march in Brussels, 28 September 2017