Ireland conservatives protest abortion clinic

World

Ireland conservatives protest abortion clinic

Close

The first abortion clinic in Ireland opened Thursday in Belfast, sparking protests by conservatives

18 October,2012 07:39 pm

The Marie Stopes family planning center will offer the abortion pill to women who are less than nine weeks pregnant but only if doctors determine theyre at risk of death or long-term health damage from their pregnancy.Thats the law in both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, where abortion is otherwise illegal.But more than 200 protesters opposed to abortion under any circumstances gathered outside the central Belfast clinic hours ahead of its opening Thursday, waving placards reading Keep Ireland abortion free.And Northern Ireland Attorney General John Larkin wrote to lawmakers, who broadly oppose abortion, offering his help if they investigate the clinics operations.Larkin said he could order the clinic to be closed only if evidence emerged of serious criminal conduct there.Protesters demanded that the clinic be shut down regardless, lest it become a beachhead for expanding abortion rights in Northern Ireland, the only corner of the United Kingdom that has not legalized abortion on demand.Were in 2012. Womens health is not in danger. Women are not dying because they cannot get abortions, said Bernadette Smyth, the Protestant leader of a Belfast anti-abortion group called Precious Life.For Marie Stopes, this is only a first step, said Liam Gibson from the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, a predominantly Catholic pressure group.He called on Belfast police to arrest the clinics doctors and directors if they give women information about abortion services in neighboring Britain, where abortions have been legal since 1967. About 4,000 women from the Republic of Ireland and 1,000 from Northern Ireland travel there annually for abortions.Officials from Marie Stopes, a British charity that already operates such clinics in more than 40 countries, said they expect to provide relatively few abortions in Northern Ireland, given the heavy legal restrictions.But they said Belfast, and all of Ireland, needed a non-judgmental, non-threatening place where women in crisis pregnancies could go for guidance. They said their office was already receiving calls from women in the Republic of Ireland, where its illegal to receive shipments of the abortion pill through the mail.Mostly what well be doing is offering advice. Many of the people we see we wont be able to treat, because of the legal framework, said Tracey McNeill, vice president of Marie Stopes.McNeill said she had no problem with the protesters so long as they didnt threaten or intimidate clients. Its important that people express their views in a democracy, she said.Police erected crowd-control barriers outside the clinic on Great Victoria Street, one of Belfasts broadest boulevards, to prevent protesters from blocking the clinics entrance and sidewalk. Clinic directors had tried to keep its location secret but that information was leaked last week.The Roman Catholic Church, the largest church in both parts of Ireland, this week launched a monthlong campaign to press the Irish government to strengthen its constitutional ban on abortion. It has denounced the Belfast clinics opening but shied away from calling for protests.We are in the middle of a struggle for the soul of Northern Ireland, said Bishop Donal McKeown, the senior Catholic in Belfast, who didnt attend the protest. He said Marie Stopes directors were seeking to promote the acceptability of abortion.Elsewhere in Northern Ireland, a group of teenagers at a Catholic high school announced they would hold daily lunchtime prayers for the clinic to be closed.