06 June 2012

In Turkey, Abortion Law Sparks New Battle Over Mosque Versus State

.... On Sunday, roughly 3,000 women marched alongside their sons and husbands through Istanbul’s Kadikoy district carrying banners that implored the government to “Keep your hands off me” and singing a famous Turkish protest song called: “I was born free, I shall live free.”

Since 1983, abortion has been legal in Turkey until 10 weeks after conception. Yet last week, with a speech in Istanbul, the country’s deeply religious prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, launched his government’s plan to prohibit all abortions four weeks after a child is conceived. “Every abortion is a murder,” Erdogan said. [The Daily Beast] Read more