A woman holds her child as she watches Vladimir Putin’s televised address to the Russian parliament in Moscow, Russia, 21 February 2023. Photo: EPA-EFE/MAXIM SHIPENKOV
The Prosecutor General’s Office in northwestern Russia’s Vologda region has declared six instances in which women were refused abortions to have been illegal.
State Duma Deputy Alexey Kanaev contacted the Vologda region Prosecutor General’s Office in February after receiving two complaints from women who were refused abortions in the region. He was subsequently informed that an investigation into the claims had revealed six instances in which clinics had unlawfully refused to perform abortions.
Two misdemeanour cases have been opened, the Prosecutor General’s Office said, with doctors accused of denying women medical treatment risking a fine of up to 25,000 rubles (€270), while hospitals may be fined up to 150,000 rubles (€1,615). Regional prosecutors have also issued 19 warnings to medical clinics across the Vologda region.
The Prosecutor General’s Office also reported that one of the women, whose complaint Kanaev described in his initial information request, has received pretrial settlement money from the Vologda City Maternity Hospital.
In a statement posted on Telegram, Kanaev thanked “women who are not afraid to fight back” for speaking up after being denied an abortion.
In early February, Vologda Governor Georgy Filimonov proposed a total ban on abortions in the region, a first in Russia, promising compensation to the clinics who refused to carry out abortion procedures, as part of his campaign to stop the “depopulation of the Russian North”.
While the law has not been enacted, some clinics in the region began preemptively complying with it and privately refusing women who were referred for abortions with one resident having to travel to the neighbouring Yaroslavl region to access an abortion, which cost her 50,000 rubles (€540).
