BRUSSELS (LifeSiteNews) — The European Parliament has adopted a radical resolution that calls for the inclusion of virtually unrestricted abortion in the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights.
On Thursday, 336 MEPs voted in favor of the text, 163 voted against, and 39 abstained. However, almost 167 MEPs did not participate in the vote, meaning that less than half of the total 705 members of parliament voted in favor of the non-binding resolution that seeks to declare “access” to abortion a “fundamental right.”
The resolution seeks to amend Article 3 of the EU Rights Charter to state that “everyone has the right to bodily autonomy, to free, informed, full and universal access to SRHR [so-called ‘sexual and reproductive health rights’], and to all related healthcare services, without discrimination,” including abortion, which, being the destruction of innocent children, is not health care.
According to a press release by the European Parliament, proponents of the pro-abortion text condemned an alleged “backsliding on women’s rights,” referring to abortion, “and all attempts to restrict or remove existing protections” for abortion and other purported “sexual and reproductive health rights,” both among EU member states and around the world.
The resolution calls for a complete decriminalization of abortion, citing the WHO’s 2022 abortion guidelines, and for countries such as Poland and Malta to repeal laws that restrict or ban the killing of unborn babies.
The text also attacks doctors and nurses who refuse to participate in an abortion due to conscience objections, falsely claiming that delaying abortions could harm women. Direct abortion is always gravely immoral and never needed nor ethically justified to save a mother’s life or protect her health.
The document demands that “Abortion methods and procedures should be an obligatory part of the curriculum for doctors and medical students” and that member states ensure “comprehensive and age-appropriate sexuality and relationship education.”
According to the press release, MEPs who supported the resolution are concerned about pro-life groups receiving increased funding and called on the European Commission to ensure that pro-life organizations “do not receive EU funding.”
In order to change the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights to include the “right” to abortion, unanimous agreement among all 27 member states would be needed.
Two days before the vote, the bishops of the European Union condemned the plan to include the “right to abortion” in the EU Charter, reiterating that “Abortion can never be a fundamental right.”
“The right to life is the fundamental pillar of all other human rights, especially the right to life of the most vulnerable, fragile and defenceless, like the unborn child in the womb of the mother, the migrant, the old, the person with disabilities and the sick,” the bishops added.
READ: Catholic bishops condemn EU resolution to declare abortion a ‘fundamental right’
Adina Portaru, senior legal counsel for ADF International in Brussels, stressed that governments “should protect the most vulnerable in their countries – including babies in the womb.”
“A Europe that is truly committed to human rights is one that respects and protects both lives in a pregnancy – supporting both mother and child,” she said.
Portaru noted that everyone has the right to life and that pushing doctors to participate in abortion violates their right to freedom of conscience:
336 of the total 705 Members of the European Parliament voted on a contested, non-binding resolution concerning abortion today, but international law remains clear and consistent – everybody has the right to life, no matter their age, sex, ability, background, or stage of development. The resolution goes as far as to denounce medical doctors in Italy, Slovakia and Romania who object to performing abortions – in clear violation of their right to freedom of conscience, and in deliberate ignorance of their researched medical judgement. The European Union is not called to change abortion policies internationally, nor inside member states, and in reality, a non-binding resolution like this has no power to amend the EU Charter on Fundamental Rights.
Countering the pro-abortion talking point that restrictions on abortion put pregnant women at risk, the legal expert said:
Poland, where mothers and babies are widely protected in law, has one of the lowest maternal mortality rates in the world. Malta, similarly, has seen zero maternal deaths from any cause in the last ten years. Hungary has implemented wide-ranging policies to better support and empower parents to raise their children. Instead of promoting a procedure which ends the lives of children and can cause harm to women, Europe should empower mothers, protect babies, and support families to thrive.
In July 2022, shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark decision to overturn Roe v. Wade in the Dobbs v. Jackson decision, the EU parliament adopted a similar resolution that demanded, among other things, to include “access” to abortion as a “right” into the EU Charter.
The push by the EU to fabricate a “right” to kill unborn children can be viewed as a response to the overturning of Roe and comes on the heels of France becoming the first country in the world that added abortion as a guaranteed “freedom” in its constitution.
READ: Macron vows to push abortion into EU rights charter after France enshrines it in constitution