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French lawmakers push for abortion rights to be enshrined in constitution

After the seismic decision of the US Supreme Court on Friday, French MPs are calling for the right to abortion in France to be protected by the constitution.

Published: 25 June 2022 13:39 CEST
Updated: 25 June 2022 15:42 CEST

Aurore Berge is among the French MPs leading the charge to enshrine abortion rights in the constitution. (Photo by Alain JOCARD / AFP)

Lawmakers from French President Emmanuel Macron’s Renaissance party are to propose a parliamentary bill on Saturday that would enshrine the right to abortion in the constitution.

The move comes after the US Supreme Court overturned the landmark 1973 “Roe v. Wade” decision on Friday.

“In France we guarantee and advance the rights of women. We protect them,” said Aurore Bergé – the head of Renaissance in the Assemblée nationale and one of the key sponsors of the bill.

Another co-sponsor, Marie-Pierre Rixain tweeted: “What happens in elsewhere cannot happen in France. We must protect the right to abortion for future generations.

Ce qui arrive ailleurs ne doit advenir en 🇫🇷!
Nous devons sanctuariser le droit à l’#IVG pour les générations futures

Je dépose avec @auroreberge présidente de groupe, une proposition de loi constitutionnelle visant à inscrire dans notre Constitution le droit à l’#avortement pic.twitter.com/UrTSpZYPcS

— Marie-Pierre Rixain (@RixainMP) June 25, 2022

In 2018 and 2019, Emmanuel Macron’s party – which back then was known as La République en Marche – refused to back bills proposed by left-wing party, La France Insoumise, to enshrine abortion rights into the constitution.

In a Saturday interview with France Inter, Bergé suggested that the success of Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National during parliamentary elections earlier this month had created a sense of newfound urgency.

She described the far-right MPs as “fierce opponents of women’s access to abortion” and said it was important “to take no risk” in securing it.

French Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne has come out in support of the bill.

The left-wing opposition block, NUPES, also backs it and had planned to propose an identical piece legislation of its own on Monday.

Macron is seeking parliamentary allies to pass reforms after his formation lost its majority in legislative elections earlier this month.

The legal timeframe to terminate a pregnancy in France was extended from 12 to 14 weeks in the last legislature.

Changing the constitution requires the National Assembly and Senate to adopt the same text, then a three-fifths majority of parliament sitting in congress. The other option is a referendum.

Member comments

Anonymous - 27 June 2022 at 18:36 CEST

What is the point of this move exactly? France has no organized pro-life movement to speak of. The right to abortion has broad support among the electorate. It seems like empty symbolism.
Anonymous - 29 June 2022 at 21:48 CEST

I agree that this seems unneeded. As a US Citizen, however, I should explain that the overturning of Roe v Wade here is not what many believe it to be. It simply returns the question of abortion to the individual states, which is where the court believe it should be decided based on the wishes of the people in those states. The controversy is about whether the FEDERAL constitution guarantees abortion rights. Many states (maybe most) will continue to allow abortion, which varying regulations. The decision does NOT make abortion illegal.

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Azerbaijan vehemently rejects the accusation it bears responsibility for the riots that have led to the deaths of five people and rattled the Paris government.

But it is just the latest in a litany of tensions between Paris and Baku and not the first time France has accused Azerbaijan of being behind an alleged disinformation campaign.

The riots in New Caledonia, a French territory lying between Australia and Fiji, were sparked by moves to agree a new voting law that supporters of independence from France say discriminates against the indigenous Kanak population.

Paris points to the sudden emergence of Azerbaijani flags alongside Kanak symbols in the protests, while a group linked to the Baku authorities is openly backing separatists while condemning Paris.

“This isn’t a fantasy. It’s a reality,” interior minister Gérald Darmanin told television channel France 2 when asked if Azerbaijan, China and Russia were interfering in New Caledonia.

“I regret that some of the Caledonian pro-independence leaders have made a deal with Azerbaijan. It’s indisputable,” he alleged.

But he added: “Even if there are attempts at interference… France is sovereign on its own territory, and so much the better”.

“We completely reject the baseless accusations,” Azerbaijan’s foreign ministry spokesman Ayhan Hajizadeh said.

“We refute any connection between the leaders of the struggle for freedom in Caledonia and Azerbaijan.”

In images widely shared on social media, a reportage broadcast Wednesday on the French channel TF1 showed some pro-independence supporters wearing T-shirts adorned with the Azerbaijani flag.

Tensions between Paris and Baku have grown in the wake of the 2020 war and 2023 lightning offensive that Azerbaijan waged to regain control of its breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region from ethnic Armenian separatists.

France is a traditional ally of Christian Armenia, Azerbaijan’s neighbour and historic rival, and is also home to a large Armenian diaspora.

Darmanin said Azerbaijan – led since 2003 by President Ilham Aliyev, who succeeded his father Heydar – was a “dictatorship”.

On Wednesday, the Paris government also banned social network TikTok from operating in New Caledonia.

Tiktok, whose parent company is Chinese, has been widely used by protesters. Critics fear it is being employed to spread disinformation coming from foreign countries.

Azerbaijan invited separatists from the French territories of Martinique, French Guiana, New Caledonia and French Polynesia to Baku for a conference in July 2023.

The meeting saw the creation of the “Baku Initiative Group”, whose stated aim is to support “French liberation and anti-colonialist movements”.

The group published a statement this week condemning the French parliament’s proposed change to New Caledonia’s constitution, which would allow outsiders who moved to the territory at least 10 years ago the right to vote in its elections.

Pro-independence forces say that would dilute the vote of Kanaks, who make up about 40 percent of the population.

“We stand in solidarity with our Kanak friends and support their fair struggle,” the Baku Initiative Group said.

Raphael Glucksmann, the lawmaker heading the list for the French Socialists in June’s European Parliament elections, told Public Senat television that Azerbaijan had made “attempts to interfere… for months”.

He said the underlying problem behind the unrest was a domestic dispute over election reform, not agitation fomented by “foreign actors”.

But he accused Azerbaijan of “seizing on internal problems.”

A French government source, who asked not to be named, said pro-Azerbaijani social media accounts had on Wednesday posted an edited montage purporting to show two white police officers with rifles aimed at dead Kanaks.

“It’s a pretty massive campaign, with around 4,000 posts generated by (these) accounts,” the source told AFP.

“They are reusing techniques already used during a previous smear campaign called Olympia.”

In November, France had already accused actors linked to Azerbaijan of carrying out a disinformation campaign aimed at damaging its reputation over its ability to host the Olympic Games in Paris. Baku also rejected these accusations.