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Women protest in Poland, demanding easier access to abortion

PR dla Zagranicy
Paweł Kononczuk 24.10.2016 17:27
Women protested in over 50 Polish cities on Monday demanding more liberal abortion laws, easier access to family planning and action to tackle violence and harassment.
Demonstrators in central Warsaw. Photo: PAP/Jakub KamińskiDemonstrators in central Warsaw. Photo: PAP/Jakub Kamiński

Figures on the turnout were not immediately available but the onet.pl website reported that several hundred women took part in a protest in the southwestern city of Wrocław, and around 200 in Kielce, south-central Poland.

In Warsaw, demonstrators brandished banners saying: “We have brains as well as a uterus.”

Counter-demonstrations took place in some cities.

The protest organisers have been collecting signatures for a petition to MPs against discrimination.

The petition includes demands to put a stop to vulgar and sexist language and to eliminate sexual harassment.

Earlier this month, women dressed in sombre colours took to the streets of Polish cities in a so-called Black Protest against a controversial citizens’ bill to ban abortion.

Several days later, deputies threw out the bill, which if passed would have seen staunchly Catholic Poland’s already restrictive abortion laws tightened further.

Meanwhile, members of parliament rejected a rival bid to liberalise the law on abortion. (pk)

Source: IAR/onet.pl/TVP

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