Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday spoke out against the country’s total ban on abortion and called for “prudent measures” to be taken so that “women’s rights and freedoms” are respected.
“The state is interested in solving the demographic problem and wants women, after learning about their pregnancy, to make a decision in favor of preserving the life of the child. This is clear. But, I repeat, the Women’s rights and freedoms must be respected.”he said, according to various Russian media.
Vladimir Putin alluded to the increase in illegal alcohol consumption during the prohibition period of “perestroika,” a series of political reforms implemented in the late 1980s.
The decline in the birth rate is linked to social welfare and more measures are needed, such as mortgages and subsidies “and an improvement of all forms of support for families with children”he claimed.
His comments come after the Legislative Assembly of Russia’s Nizhny Novgorod region presented a bill to the Duma (lower house of the Russian parliament) that aims to ban private clinics from performing abortions.
In recent months, private clinics in the Chelyabinsk, Lipetsk, Kursk, Tatarstan and Crimea regions, which have been under Moscow since 2014, have refused to perform these types of procedures in private clinics, among others.
At the federal level, there is a growing consensus on imposing fines for encouraging abortion.
In the Kaliningrad region, doctors can be fined up to 50,000 rubles (500 euros) for carrying out voluntary terminations of pregnancy.
The regions of Mordovia and Tver have passed similar legislation.
Patriarch Cyril, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, called on the State Duma in November to regulate abortion at the federal level, saying such a move could boost the country’s demographic growth.
Source: DN
