WARSAW, Poland – Some carried signs saying “I’m afraid to live here”. Others sang “Think” by Aretha Franklin. But everyone was determined to express their indignation at Poland’s almost total ban on abortion.
For the third consecutive night, thousands took to the streets of Poland’s capital Warsaw and other cities in the country on Friday to protest a Constitutional Court decision on abortion.
The decision, which became law on Wednesday, makes termination of pregnancy with fetal defects unconstitutional and eliminates the most commonly used legal reason for abortion in the eastern European country.
The demonstrations, led by the human rights group Women’s Strike, broke out almost immediately after their entry into force.
Among the protesters was Ola Bakowska, 31, who told NBC News by telephone on Saturday that he took to the streets on Wednesday to “vent” and “show my disagreement” with the new law.
She added that she was encouraged by the number of people who attended all the protests.
While abortion was the main focus, climate change activists and members of the LGBTQ communities were among those who took to the streets, amid fears of a wider erosion of civil liberties.
Among them Marek Elas, 36, an environmental activist who works with the Global Fund for Nature in Poland, said on Thursday that the Polish government is “working to limit human rights”.
He added that “the government thought women were the easiest to beat, which was not true”.
Bakowska, a project manager, agreed that many of the protesters wanted to express their broader anger at the government, which she said was “aimed at the rights of many people, not just the rights of women” with their “traditional but outdated values. “.
LGBTQ communities are among those that suffer, she said. “It’s like they’re invisible,” she added.
Poland’s ruling Law and Justice party, also known as PiS, promised a return to more conservative social norms before coming to power in 2015. Since then, abortion has become a highly controversial issue in the predominantly Catholic country.
He supported the decision on the abortion law in October, which was also followed by protests across the country.
According to the new rules, abortion can only be carried out in case of rape or incest or when the mother’s health or life is at risk, putting Poland outside the European context. Doctors who defy the law can be sentenced to prison.
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Krzysztof Sobolewski, a senior PiS officer, told the state news agency PAP on Saturday that the protests were illegal and defied the social detachment rules in place to contain the coronavirus pandemic, as 14 arrests were made across the country in Thursday and more on Friday night.
Lawyer Eliza Rutynowska told NBC News on Friday that some protesters were detained in police stations up to 25 miles from the city. NBC News was unable to verify this independently.
Many of her clients, for whom she was acting pro-bono, said they were angry “at the way human rights are being violated in Poland today,” she said.
“It may seem that Poland is moving to the right, but inside, we are seeing a strong movement for freedom,” he added. “This is essentially a fight for our rights and our lives.”
Human and reproductive rights groups condemned the restrictive abortion law and warned of a wider erosion of civil liberties and a shift to the right by the government.
“This measure is an outrageous violation of the basic duty of the authorities to protect the lives and health of their citizens,” said Irene Donadio, of the European Network of the International Federation of Family Planning.
But for Beata Jedynak, 60, who supports the government, watching the protests left her feeling “devastated and disgusted,” she told NBC News.
“I just don’t know what this fight is about, whether to overthrow the government or to present views entirely from the left,” she said.
But Bakowska said they “would not give up”, adding: “We will continue to protest”.
Liza Galica reported from Warsaw and Adela Suliman from London.
Reuters contributed to this report.