This is the latest proposal from a member of a political group here in
The Netherlands.
Meta
Abort 'unloved' Antilleans, says Rotterdam politician
20 February 2006
AMSTERDAM Alderman Marianne van den Anker for the Leefbaar Rotterdam
(LR) party has called for a debate in Rotterdam on compulsory
abortion and contraception for mothers she believes are responsible
for raising unloved babies that fall victim to child abuse.
SWA, a foundation promoting health among Antilleans and Arubans in
Rotterdam, said the alderman's comments were degrading. It called on
the Mayor Ivo Opstelten and the LR's coalition partners, the Christian
Democrat (CDA) and Liberal (VVD) parties, to distance themselves from
Van den Anker's views. She has also received dozens of emails
criticising her ideas.
As legal experts pointed out, Van
den Anker's plan would never be permitted, a CDA spokesperson warned:
"If Leefbaar Rotterdam raises this idea in the talks to form a new
coalition, the CDA will not be part of such an executive."
The VVD said women had a right to control their own bodies and the
government could not interfere.
Van den Anker is a mother of two children and the official in charge
of Rotterdam's health and security portfolios. She is also a candidate
in the local elections.
In an interview in newspaper 'NRC Handelsblad' on Saturday, she said
she had tried everything to prevent child abuse. "I fail, I fail," she
told the interviewer as she outlined her controversial idea for a
debate on compulsory abortion and contraception.
The three target groups she has in mind are Antillean teenage mothers;
drug addicts and people with mental handicaps.
Van den Anker said children from these groups run an "unacceptable
risk" of growing up without love and with "violence, neglect,
mistreatment and sexual abuse."
"The exceptions, are there are some, can be counted on a pair of
hands," she said.
The politician told the newspaper the courts would decide on whether
abortion was the right option. The decision would be based on experts
and care workers who "who can see in 95 percent or even 100 percent of
cases whether the child has a chance of growing up with love".
Van den Anker supported her argument by suggesting that there were a
lot of Antillean youth gangs in Rotterdam whose members come from
loveless homes. The gangs, she said, committed rapes, were loverboys
(pimps) and guilty of street terror.
"Antillean youths who commit serious crimes have been through
everything themselves. History repeats itself and they visit the
tragedy of their life history on others," she said.
[Copyright Expatica News + ANP 2006]
Subject: Dutch news
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