Fifty years after the Veil Law and one year after abortion was enshrined in the Constitution, the Senate voted this Thursday on a bill aimed at rehabilitating women convicted of illegal abortions before 1975. Led by former minister Laurence Rossignol and supported by the government, the bill acknowledges that these convictions constituted an "attack on women's rights" and a source of "physical and moral suffering."
The proposal also provides for the creation of a commission to collect and transmit the memory of these women, without providing for compensation. Welcomed by feminist associations, this initiative comes at a time when the right to abortion is under threat in several countries.
This vote comes on top of another initiative led by the Socialists aimed at rehabilitating people convicted of homosexuality between 1942 and 1982, which is awaiting final adoption by Parliament.
