Pro-Life Czechs march to commemorate victims of abortion

Pro-life Christians marched in Prague last Friday to commemorate the loss of millions of unborn children from fifty years of legalised abortion in the Czech Republic, according to the Czech News Agency (CTK).

The Czech pro-life campaign Movement for Life organised the demonstration attended also by pro-life supporters from the United Kingdom, Hungary, and Italy, reports Peter J. Smith, LifeSiteNews.com. Marchers carried white crosses with each one representing 10,000 aborted children and held a picture of an embryo and the Virgin Mary at the head of the procession. They also tossed 300 red roses into the Vltava River from Charles Bridge, and later attended a Mass dedicated to unborn children.

Abortion for whatever reason is legal up to the first 12 weeks of pregnancy with medical exceptions (such as foetal deformity) up to 24 weeks of pregnancy.

Soviet-era Czechoslovakia first legalised abortion in 1957, and later in 1986 lifted most restrictions resulting in a surge of abortions in the late 80s to early 90s. The abortion rate peaked in 1988 at 113,730 leaving as many as one in three unborn children killed through abortion.

The Czech Republic's statistical office has released a report for 2006 indicating that the country's abortion rate has fallen to the lowest level ever documented of 25,400 induced abortions; 77 per cent of unborn victims were aborted within 8 weeks of pregnancy.

"Even though the number of abortions has been decreasing, 70 children are still aborted every day," Zdenka Rybova, Vice-President of Movement for Life and an organiser of the Prague march, told CTK.

However Rybova and other pro-life campaigners face an uphill battle to change Czech attitudes toward abortion. A May 2007 CVVM poll found 72 per cent of Czechs believe that abortion should be allowed "at the request of the woman," 19 per cent advocate its legality for "societal reasons," 5 per cent favor allowing it only if "a woman's health is at risk," and a mere 1 per cent say it should be "banned." These results show support for abortion at its highest levels since 1990.

"The existence of such a perverted evil as killing innocent children in [their] mother's womb has been deeply anchored in society over the [past] 50 years," Rybova told crowds at another Movement for Life demonstration in Prague earlier in March. "A change is urgent."

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[01/03/2008]

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