Chile’s Congress on Wednesday began discussing the decriminalization of abortion within the first 14 weeks of term, which was presented in 2018 and is opposed by the government of the conservative Sebastián Piñera.
Wearing green T-shirts – the color associated with a movement to legalize abortion – and shouting “Abortion yes, abortion no, that’s for me to decide!”, some of the left and center-left MPs who promoted the initiative arrived at parliament with sights set on the recent decriminalization in Argentina.
“Today we begin the path towards the legal and social decriminalization of abortion in Chile. Abortions exist and will continue to exist. It is in our hands to stop persecuting adolescents and women who do not have the resources to do so in clinics,” said Maite Orsini, opposition MP and chairwoman of the parliamentary commission where the project is discussed.
“Abortion is a decision of women and it is necessary to get out of hiding, insecurity and stigma. No more mandatory maternity,” Commons Party deputy Camila Rojas added on Twitter.
Unlike the law approved in Argentina in December, the Chilean project is limited only to decriminalizing abortion and does not guarantee or provide the provision or support of the State.
Minutes before the start of the discussion, there were moments of tension between groups both in favor and against the move at the doors of the Chamber of Deputies in the coastal city of Valparaíso, 100 kilometers west of the capital.
As the parliamentary discussion progressed, in Santiago dozens of women from the powerful 8M Feminist Coordinator group held a protest at the gates of the presidential palace and pasted posters with the slogan “Free, legal, safe and free-of-charge abortion” on the facade of the Catholic University of Chile, one of the most conservative study institutions in the country.
“We hope to open a debate that is played [out] in the streets, as happened in Argentina, and that overflows [into] parliament,” the Coordinator’s spokesperson, Karina Nohales, told EFE.