Amnesty International pressures Peru to legalize abortion

Lima, Peru, Oct 27, 2010 / 11:51 am

Amnesty International has announced it will give Peru's ministry of health a petition signed by 11,000 people calling for the legalization of abortion.

The organization’s secretary general, Salil Shetty, will meet Oct. 27 with Peru’s vice minister of health, Zarela Solis Vasquez. Shetty plans to deliver the petition signed by abortion supporters from Peru as well as other countries.

Last year in the northern Peruvian city of Chiclayo, the local diocese organized its own petition opposing abortion that was signed by 33,000 people.

Amnesty International has been distributing a report throughout the country titled, “Fatal Deficiencies: The Barriers to Maternal Health in Peru,” in which it argues that the legalization of abortion could diminish maternal mortality in rural areas.  The report calls for changes in the country’s laws that would allow for abortion in cases of fetal deformation and for underage girls who become pregnant.

The report also encourages Peru to give in to the U.N.'s pressure to legalize abortion. It uses the case of Karen  Llantoy, a Peruvian woman who was not allowed to abort after doctors discovered her baby was suffering from anacephaly (a condition in which the brain does not develop) because the mother’s life was not at risk.

Founded by a British Catholic, Amnesty International abandoned its neutrality on abortion several years ago and, as many analysts predicted, has become a pro-abortion organization.