The tragic case of a 13-year-old girl who became pregnant after being repeatedly raped by her 66-year-old grandfather has reopened public debate on Chile’s status as one of six states in the world which bans abortion in all cases.
On Wednesday local press broke the story of the young girl who, upon finding out that she was three months pregnant, revealed that she had been sexually abused by her grandfather since the age of six.
The adolescent, who lives with her family in the borough of Independencia in Santiago, initially hid the truth and attributed the pregnancy to an attack she suffered in the street. However, she later confessed with the support of her sister, who has witnessed her grandfather’s abuse in the past, after which the girl’s mother reported the crime.
Various failed attempts have been made to push bills reinstating therapeutic abortion — banned under the dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet just months before it relinquished power — which would de-penalize the termination of a pregnancy in cases in which the mother’s life is at risk, the fetus is unviable or in the case of rape.
Carolina Carreras, president of the feminist center for research and political activism Corporación Humanas, sees this as one more example of human rights violations towards women in Chile.
“The fact that the state is obligating a 13-year-old girl to go ahead with the pregnancy is degrading by international standards,” Carreras told The Santiago Times.
As Carreras explains, the implications of the forced pregnancy are furthermore aggravated by the girl’s tender age.
“We’re talking about a girl whose body is still developing … these are high-risk pregnancies,” she said. “In addition, there’s a big psychological risk in forcing a girl to become a mother. The consequences go beyond physical health risks.”
This is not an isolated case. In June this year Chile came under the international spotlight when an 11-year-old girl became pregnant following similar abuse from her mother’s partner. In the same month, another thirteen-year old girl was found to be 14-weeks pregnant by her 61-year-old uncle. Carreras affirms that stories such as these are by no means rare in Chile, and are largely provoked by the country’s high rate of violence against women.
The Universidad Diego Portales’ 2013 “Report on Human Rights in Chile” estimates that around 70,000 clandestine abortions occur every year in Chile, a phenomenon that sheds light on another issue associated with the legislation — economic inequality.
The most recent Center for Public Studies (CEP) survey found that 63 percent of all respondents — both male and female — were in favor of decriminalizing therapeutic abortion.
Chile is one of only six states that ban abortion in all cases, the others being the Vatican, Malta, Dominican Republic, El Salvador and Nicaragua.
By Mimi Yagoub (mimi@santiagotimes.cl)
On Wednesday local press broke the story of the young girl who, upon finding out that she was three months pregnant, revealed that she had been sexually abused by her grandfather since the age of six.
The adolescent, who lives with her family in the borough of Independencia in Santiago, initially hid the truth and attributed the pregnancy to an attack she suffered in the street. However, she later confessed with the support of her sister, who has witnessed her grandfather’s abuse in the past, after which the girl’s mother reported the crime.
Various failed attempts have been made to push bills reinstating therapeutic abortion — banned under the dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet just months before it relinquished power — which would de-penalize the termination of a pregnancy in cases in which the mother’s life is at risk, the fetus is unviable or in the case of rape.
Carolina Carreras, president of the feminist center for research and political activism Corporación Humanas, sees this as one more example of human rights violations towards women in Chile.
“The fact that the state is obligating a 13-year-old girl to go ahead with the pregnancy is degrading by international standards,” Carreras told The Santiago Times.
As Carreras explains, the implications of the forced pregnancy are furthermore aggravated by the girl’s tender age.
“We’re talking about a girl whose body is still developing … these are high-risk pregnancies,” she said. “In addition, there’s a big psychological risk in forcing a girl to become a mother. The consequences go beyond physical health risks.”
This is not an isolated case. In June this year Chile came under the international spotlight when an 11-year-old girl became pregnant following similar abuse from her mother’s partner. In the same month, another thirteen-year old girl was found to be 14-weeks pregnant by her 61-year-old uncle. Carreras affirms that stories such as these are by no means rare in Chile, and are largely provoked by the country’s high rate of violence against women.
The Universidad Diego Portales’ 2013 “Report on Human Rights in Chile” estimates that around 70,000 clandestine abortions occur every year in Chile, a phenomenon that sheds light on another issue associated with the legislation — economic inequality.
The most recent Center for Public Studies (CEP) survey found that 63 percent of all respondents — both male and female — were in favor of decriminalizing therapeutic abortion.
Chile is one of only six states that ban abortion in all cases, the others being the Vatican, Malta, Dominican Republic, El Salvador and Nicaragua.
By Mimi Yagoub (mimi@santiagotimes.cl)
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