Catholic weekly in Poland fined for questioning 'award' granted to woman who sought illegal abortion

Krakow, Poland, Sep 24, 2009 / 14:08 pm

A Polish court has imposed a fine of $10,288 on the Catholic weekly "Gosc Niedzielny" of the Archdiocese of Katowice for questioning a ruling by the European Human Rights Court that ordered the state to pay a large sum of money to a short-sighted woman who was denied an illegal abortion.
 
The woman in question was Alicja Tysiac, a mother pregnant with her third child who asked to have abortion in 2000 when she learned her unborn child could inherit her shortsightedness.  Tysiac’s case was studied by several Polish doctors who said it did not meet criteria for a legal abortion.  Although she insisted on aborting her child, doctors told her that the baby posed no risk to her life. She eventually gave birth and afterwards suffered from a partially detached retina, which made her shortsightedness worse.
 
Her case is being used by numerous anti-life groups to push for abortion in Poland and was brought before the EU Human Rights Court in Strasburg.  In 2007 it ruled that she be paid $36,710.  Poland unsuccessfully appealed the ruling.
 
Now, Tysiac will receive $10,288 additional dollars as a result of the fine imposed on the Catholic weekly Gosc Niedzielny for “offending” her with the article by its editor Father Marek Gancarczyk.
 
“We live in a world in which a mother receives an award for all her efforts to kill her child, even though she was not allowed to do so,” the priest wrote.
 
He compared abortion to Nazi practices and lamented that people “have become accustomed to murders carried out outside the gates of a (concentration) camp.”
 
The weekly protested the ruling because it violates freedom of expression and said it would file an appeal.