Pro-life leader denounces 'terrorism' of pro-choice activists occupying Mexican state capitol

Chetumal, Mexico, Mar 1, 2021 / 15:08 pm

A pro-life leader in Mexico has called the occupation of the legislature in Quintana Roo state by pro-abortion feminists "green terrorism", after the color adopted by pro-abortion activists in Latin America.

Speaking to ACI Prensa, CNA's Spanish language news partner, Brenda del Río, the founder and director of the National Campaign for Life--Long Live Mexico, said that "We Mexican women who work in the pro-woman cause have dissociated ourselves from the terrorist acts that a handful of women, including Argentine and Venezuelan women, have carried out since late November by seizing the Quintana Roo state congress."

According to the Monterrey daily El Norte, the women had been holding a sit-in outside the congress building in Chetumal beginning Nov. 25, 2020, and then stormed the building and set up camp inside Nov. 27.

They announced they would not let anyone enter the building until the legislature held a session to vote on an abortion bill. They also demanded that the police not be called to dislodge them. Several legislators later arrived to dialogue with the protestors and agreed to allow the protest and meet with the demonstrators Nov. 30.

del Río said the activists "have camped inside the premises, preventing the legislature from doing its work." The activists also brought along dogs "to look even more defiant," and "are threatening legislators if they don't pass the right to abortion."

For del Río, those "directly responsible" for the violent actions of feminists are local legislators Ana Pamplona and José Luis Guillén, who have introduced bills to decriminalize abortion on demand for up to 12 weeks pregnancy in Quintana Roo.

El Universal news reported that a few hours after the feminists took over the building, Pamplona arrived as part of a legislative delegation to listen to their demands and give them guarantees they would not be prosecuted for occupying the building.

del Río charged that both Pamplona and Guillén have allowed the message to go out to society that "if you want to advance a social cause, legal or illegal, you have to vandalize, threaten, take over public buildings and force lawmakers to fulfill an international agenda that is alien to the principles of Mexico. This amounts to the promotion of violence."

Although the feminists pledged to leave the premises in early February, they stepped up their attack after pro-life legislators managed Feb. 24 temporarily to stop the attempt to pass the bill legalizing abortion.

Hooded activists have tagged the legislature with graffiti and caused damage.

The feminists recently replaced the Mexican flag outside the legislature with a large green cloth banner emblazoned with the slogan "abortion on demand", which the Mexican Army took down Feb. 26.

The director of the National Campaign for Life--Long Live Mexico challenged the authenticity of the feminists' commitment to women's rights.

"Is it really a healthcare problem that seven women from this state went last year to Mexico City to get an abortion? Of course not. What really is a shame in Quintana Roo … is the trafficking of children in Playa del Carmen, where pimps rent Mexican children for hours or even days to Europeans, Americans, and Canadians," del Río pointed out.

del Río stressed, "we want a Mexico where we women really have access to true healthcare and true justice."

"What do we urgently need to legalize in Mexico? Maternity. Workers who are pregnant are fired from their jobs. Pregnant women are abandoned by the man. Poor women are pressured in clinics to be temporarily or permanently sterilized. Pregnant students do not have childcare in high schools or at the university," she pointed out.

"We Mexican women cannot allow our laws to be changed from abroad, trying to kill the nation (yet to been born) by tiny groups of Mexican women, dressed up with their faces covered like a thief, threatening our legislators. Long live Mexico is what we want," del Río concluded.