Gov't urged to establish safe abortion laws after six-year legal vacuum

Korea's human rights watchdog urged the government and parliament to end the ongoing six-year legal vacuum for safe and legal pregnancy termination in line with the International Safe Abortion Day, which falls every year on Sept. 28.

A protest held in November 2020, urging the National Assembly to pass new abortion laws after the Constitutional Court ruling a year prior [JOONGANG ILBO]

Korea's human rights watchdog urged the government and parliament to end the ongoing six-year legal vacuum for safe and legal pregnancy termination in line with the International Safe Abortion Day, which falls every year on Sept. 28.

"The Constitutional Court ruled the old abortion law, which failed to balance between women's rights to her own body and the life of the fetus, as a violation of the Constitutional Law in April 2019, but the government and the National Assembly have still not established a new law to fill the vacancy," said the National Human Rights Commission of Korea on Sunday.

Even the pregnancy termination drugs, which have been designated as part of the World Health Organization's essential drug list and are being used in 100 countries around the world as a safe way to terminate pregnancy, have not even been allowed into the country.

"The continuation to keep women away from safe methods of terminating pregnancy and the restricted, oftentimes secretive, access to pregnancy termination services threatens women's rights to their health, which inevitably falls on women and youth who are already socially and economically vulnerable."

According to the human rights watchdog, 32,000 pregnancies were terminated in 2021 — not counting those that took place covertly, such as through illegal drug use. The United Nations has also consistently recommended that the Korean government remove barriers to accessing open and safe abortions.

"We cannot stand by as the government and National Assembly fail to establish appropriate legal measures for safe pregnancy termination," continued the human rights commission. "We want to emphasize that practical sex education to prevent unwanted pregnancy as well as the reinforcement of state responsibility also has to follow in order to tackle the realities of this society."

In April 2019, the Constitutional Court ruled Korea’s decades-old abortion law unconstitutional and ordered the National Assembly to develop a new law in accordance with contemporary social values by the end of 2020. No updates have been made since.

BY YOON SO-YEON [yoon.soyeon@joongang.co.kr]