Spanish Socialists block aid to pregnant women in Spain while promoting abortion in Latin America

Madrid, Spain, Jan 10, 2007 / 11:07 am

The Spanish weekly “Alba” has revealed that while the Socialist government is denying aid to local entities that provide aid to pregnant women, it is earmarking large sums of money to promote abortion throughout the world, especially in Latin America.

Reporter Luis Losada Pescador explains that years ago, the Spanish Federation of Pro-Life Entities (SFPE), which helps women in crisis pregnancies, reached an agreement with the government to receive $142,000 in economic aid each year to be distributed between 20 different associations.

While it was no where near enough to cover the needs of the SFPE, the money helped offset the rising operating costs of the organization, especially considering that “each day we receive more girls in crisis pregnancies,” explained the president of the federation, Dr. Dolores Voltas.

Nevertheless, starting in 2005, the Socialist governments in the regions of Castilla La Mancha, Andalucia, Extremadura, and Cataluña began issuing negative reports about the organization to the federal government.  According to the federation, the reports were unfounded and sprung from purely ideological reasons.  The complaints directly led to a decrease of $31,000 in annual economic aid.

Last year, the federation was no longer included among the 340 organizations that receive financing from the Ministry of Social Affairs, supposedly due to “internal re-organization.”

According to the federation, “The saddest part is that some communities that issued negative reports claimed they already provided similar services.  That was the case in Cataluña, where officials said they provided such a service through a call center.”

While organizations that help pregnant women in Spain are being denied funding, last November the Socialist government approved a grant of $3.8 million to the United Nations Population Fund, with over $1 million going directly to “reproductive health programs” that provide equipment and funding for abortion services even in countries where abortion is illegal.