Police seize foetus after abortion tip-off

By Nick Pisa in Rome
A 21-WEEK-OLD foetus was seized by Italian police in a raid on a hospital after a tip-off doctors had been paid to carry out an abortion beyond the legal time limit.

The 39-year-old mother, who had only just returned to the ward from theatre, was questioned as she lay in bed.

In Italy, terminations are allowed until the 90th day and after that until the 24th week only if the baby is seriously damaged, abnormal, or if there is a grave risk to the mother's health.

A police source said they had raided the hospital in Naples after a call "from within the clinic".

But it turned out the termination had been carried out legally after doctors told the woman the baby had a chromosome defect and there was a high risk it would be born mentally handicapped.

The woman said: "It would have been my first child. I was suffering – I wanted a child at all costs. I had no choice. He would have been ill for the rest of his life."

The news brought the abortion debate into the election spotlight, only days after would-be prime minister Silvio Berlusconi said he would back a United Nations moratorium on terminations.

Livia Turco, the health minister, said the Naples episode was the symptom of "an unacceptable climate of tension" over the issue.

http://news.scotsman.com/world/Police-seize-foetus-after-abortion.3776071.jp

Edmonton Tory's private member’s bill would protect unborn crime victims

OTTAWA — Edmonton Conservative MP Ken Epp is seeking support for a private member’s bill that would recognize the unborn as separate victims when their mothers are killed or harmed in an attack.

Epp says the Unborn Victims of Crime Act has nothing to do with abortion but is meant to fill a major gap in the law.

But critics say that’s a backdoor effort to reopen the abortion debate by sneaking a recognition of fetal rights into Canadian law.

Epp cited several cases where the killers of pregnant women were charged for the mother’s murder — but not for the death of her fetus.

That’s because the law does not recognize the unborn as human beings until they are born alive.




Epp says his proposed act is supported by people of all political

stripes because it narrowly focuses on cases where a third party harms or kills a fetus in a criminal attack.

He said the bill is constitutional and would not change the Criminal Code in any way that might undermine a woman’s legal access to abortion. A spokeswoman for the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada vehemently disagrees. Spokeswoman Joyce Arthur says the bill has been promoted by right-to-life groups, and that it would create redundant protections. Judges and parole boards can already take into account whether a convict has injured or killed an unborn child, she said. The bill is to be voted on March 5, but would be derailed if an early election is called

http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Canada/2008/02/14/4847278.html