Last week the pro-life movement savoured one of its most heartening moments in recent years. After a 15-hour debate, the Argentine senate rejected a bill that would have legalised abortion in the first 14 weeks of pregnancy, by a vote of 38-31.
The campaign to relax the country’s abortion laws had generated intense international interest. Abortion advocates believed that if they won in Argentina then they could pressurise other Latin American countries to follow suit. As it did before the Irish referendum in May, Amnesty International deployed considerable resources in support of abortion, even taking out a full-page advertisement in the New York Times warning senators that “the world is watching”. But this time its efforts came to nothing.
