San Marino voters overwhelmingly back legal abortion

ROME – Residents successful the tiny republic of San Marino voted overwhelmingly Sunday to legalize abortion, rejecting a 150-year-old instrumentality that had criminalized it and becoming the latest bulk Catholic authorities to o.k. the process nether definite circumstances, according to astir implicit returns.

With 26 of 37 polling stations counted, immoderate 76% of voters approved making termination ineligible successful the archetypal 12 weeks of pregnancy. It volition besides beryllium ineligible beyond past if the woman’s beingness is successful information oregon if her carnal oregon intelligence wellness are astatine hazard due to the fact that of fetal anomalies oregon malformations, according to authoritative returns broadcast connected San Marino TV.

Turnout was 41% of voters of San Marino, a microstate of 33,000 radical surrounded by Italy.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier communicative follows below.

SAN MARINO (AP) — Residents of San Marino, a tiny republic surrounded by Italy, voted Sunday whether to decriminalize abortion, with the Roman Catholic Church firmly opposed and the “yes” campy hoping to marque the process ineligible successful immoderate circumstances.

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The ballot connection calls for termination to beryllium made ineligible successful the archetypal 12 weeks of gestation and beyond past if the woman’s beingness is successful information oregon if her carnal oregon intelligence wellness are astatine hazard due to the fact that of fetal anomalies oregon malformations.

At the adjacent of polls, 41% of registered voters had formed a ballot, much than fractional of them women, according to San Marino TV. Results were expected precocious Sunday.

San Marino, 1 of the world’s oldest republics, has a colonisation of astir 33,000 and is 1 of the past European states that inactive criminalizes abortion. The referendum was acceptable aft astir 3,000 radical signed a petition thrust to overturn the microstate’s termination law, which dates from 1865. If “Yes” votes prevail, San Marino’s Parliament volition request to legalize the procedure.

Women successful San Marino seeking an termination usually spell to neighboring Italy, a likewise Catholic state which legalized the process successful 1978. But proponents of the referendum accidental that puts an undue fiscal load connected them and penalizes women who person gotten large arsenic a effect of rape.

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Opponents reason that successful San Marino, adjacent minors tin person escaped contraception astatine pharmacies, including the morning-after pill.

Voter Federica Gatti said Sunday arsenic she formed her ballot that a woman’s determination to terminate a gestation oregon not involves “several personal, spiritual and motivation reasons,” but that the authorities “must supply its citizens this opportunity.”

Another voter, Elisabetta Matteini, said she was against having the process personally since it took her a agelong clip to conceive her son, but said it should beryllium disposable to debar women resorting to “people who person nary competence, putting their beingness astatine risk.”

In the buildup to the vote, the bishop of San Marino, Monsignor Andrea Turazzi, said the Catholic Church was “decidedly against” the decriminalization initiative, though helium said the run had raised consciousness astir the request to supply amended services and care, particularly for mothers successful need.

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The Vatican firmly opposes abortion, holding that quality beingness begins astatine conception and that each beingness indispensable beryllium protected from conception until earthy death.

“For us, its inconceivable that a parent resorts to termination due to the fact that of immoderate economical troubles,” helium told Vatican News.

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Nicole Winfield reported from Rome.

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