This month, the Polish Sejm, the lower chamber of Poland’s parliament, narrowly rejected a bill decriminalizing assisting a woman to obtain an illegal abortion.
According to the Associated Press (AP), 218 members of the parliament voted in opposition to the bill, and 215 voted in favor of it. Two members of parliament abstained from the vote.
Abortion is only legal in Poland until 12 weeks of pregnancy, and even then, the abortion has to be in cases of sexual assault, incest, or when the mother’s life is at risk, according to Catholic News Agency. Women who obtain illegal abortions do not face criminal penalties.
“However, an abortionist who performs an illegal abortion and any person who assists the woman or the abortionist in the legal abortion could face up to three years in prison for their roles,” the article said.
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The Polish government’s progressive caucus Lewica, or the Left, spearheaded the pro-abortion bill that was ultimately defeated on July 12, according to a report from Notes From Poland.
However, the AP reported that “[l]eft wing lawmakers, who promoted the draft, vowed to repeatedly resubmit until it is adopted.”
The AP also noted that Polish President Andrzej Duda, a Catholic, expressed his opposition to abortion and stated last week that he would not sign the legislation if it did pass.
The Polish Bishops’ Conference has previously made appeals for the country to uphold its pro-life laws and protections for unborn children as pro-abortion legislation was considered.
As CatholicVote reported in May, President of the Polish Bishops’ Conference Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki stated in a pro-life appeal that he “[calls] for the building of a society of solidarity that does not exclude from our community the youngest, innocent children living under their mother’s heart.”
LifeNews Note: McKenna Snow writes for CatholicVote, where this column originally appeared.
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