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Opinion,
Comment & Reviews
Ireland and abortion |
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Ulster
Pregnancy Advisory Association closes
Commentary from BPAS
23/8/99
Family planning staff in Northern Ireland are reviewing their
security after attempts to burn down the office of a pregnancy
counselling service. The homes of staff from the Ulster Pregnancy
Advisory Association had earlier been the focus of protests
from anti-abortion campaigners and now the service has decided
to close. There are concerns that the tension will increase
next month with the arrival of prominent anti-abortion activists
from the USA. But the protests are having little effect on
the numbers of women seeking advice over the termination of
their pregnancies.
About 90 abortions are carried out in Northern Ireland each
year. The province comes under different legislation from
the rest of the UK as the 1967 Abortion Act does not apply.
Doctors whose consent is needed are deeply divided over the
issue and so up to 2,000 women a year travel elsewhere in
the UK for help. The Ulster Pregnancy Advisory Association
was one of two agencies in the province able to refer them
for treatment, but it has been forced to close after vandalism
and allegations of intimidation. The association is so alarmed
by the recent arson attack that Audrey Simpson, of the Family
Planning Association, has had to speak on its behalf. "I think
they're devastated that this is happening," she said. "They
feel that all they were trying to do was give women information.
They weren't doing anything anything illegal, they weren't
doing anything wrong, but some people tried to make that impossible
for them to continue doing that."
Anti-abortion activists in Belfast - who operate under the
name Precious Life - admit they have protested outside the
homes of staff. Bernadette Smythe, a spokeswoman for the group,
said: "There will never be any proof connecting Precious Life
with any types of violence because we oppose violence in the
womb and violence outside the womb." But this same group has
now invited prominent anti-abortionists from the US to come
to Belfast next month prompting fears among the remaining
counselling services that tensions could increase. Extremist
elements of the US anti-abortion lobby have been behind a
number of killings of abortion doctors and, although Precious
Life says its guests have not been linked to any violence,
it says it will seek "inspiration" from them.
The British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) says the number
of Irish and Northern Irish women seeking abortions in Britain
rose in 1998, despite the fact that protests have been increasing
over the past two years. BPAS spokeswoman Ann Furedi said:
"What these groups fail to appreciate is that there is a clear
and growing expectation that women in the north and south
of Ireland should have the same ability to plan their families
as women elsewhere in the UK and Europe. "These groups make
it more difficult and more gruelling for them to get advice
in their own country, but their action also reinforces both
their and abortion workers' determination." She thinks the
growing militancy of anti-abortion groups is caused by fears
that abortion legislation will be liberalised. However, she
did not think the protesters would become as violent as their
US counterparts. "There is not the degree of religious fundamentalism
in Northern Ireland that underpins society in the US," she
said. |
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