New York Times: Rights Group Denounces Illegality of Abortion in Philippines

“A new study of abortion in the Philippines denounces the government for keeping it illegal, causing what the authors describe as a ‘human rights crisis’ that victimizes tens of thousands of women every year, at least a thousand of whom die from unsafe, often crude, procedures.

The Center for Reproductive Rights, which is based in New York and did the study that was to be released Monday, said the Philippine government was directly responsible for the crisis and accused it of violating the rights of these women by failing to address the effects of the abortion ban.

‘Criminalization of abortion has not prevented abortion in the Philippines, but it has made it extremely unsafe,’ the report says.

Nancy Northup, the center’s president, said in a statement released Sunday that Manila ‘has created a dire human rights crisis’ with hundreds of thousands of women resorting to unsafe abortion ‘to protect their health, their families and their livelihood. Yet, the government sits idly by, refusing to tackle the issue or reform the policies that exacerbate it.'”

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