France has become the first country in the world to make abortion a constitutional right – with the French government saying the move is in response to a tightening of laws in the US.
A bill that was adopted by France’s Senate after a vote on Wednesday 28 February has been approved after a joint session of parliament on Monday.
French President Emmanuel Macron said last week that his government is committed to “making women’s right to have an abortion irreversible by enshrining it in the constitution”.
The French government said in its introduction to the bill that the right to have an abortion is threatened in the US, where the Supreme Court in 2022 overturned a 50-year-old ruling that used to guarantee it.
The introduction to the French legislation said: “Unfortunately, this event (in the US) is not isolated: in many countries, even in Europe, there are currents of opinion that seek to hinder at any cost the freedom of women to terminate their pregnancy if they wish.”
None of France’s major political parties represented in parliament has questioned the right to abortion, which was decriminalised in the country in 1975.
Mr Macron has reportedly been hoping the constitutional revision will set him apart from France’s far-right National Rally party ahead of the European election in June.
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The National Rally is ahead in the polls as the election gets closer, and 46 of its 88 MPs, including three-time presidential candidate Marine Le Pen voted in favour of the constitutional revision.
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