The South Korean government presented on Wednesday, October 7, its preliminary draft of legal reform that will legalize abortion for the first time in that Asian country and that will allow the free interruption of pregnancy until the fourteenth week of gestation.
The draft also contemplates the right to abort within the first twenty-four weeks in the event of a series of “social, economic and health” conditions, according to a joint statement from the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Health and Welfare.
At present, abortion within South Korea is punishable by up to one year in prison (and up to three for the doctor who performs it) and abortions are only allowed on the grounds of incest, rape, inheritance or danger for the mother, according to the law that regulates it and the law that was written in 1953.
During this project, which the Government claims to have drawn up hand in hand with different medical and legal experts, but now they must wait 40 days to receive the revision proposals before being sent to Parliament, where the Executive of the liberal president Moon Jae-in has a majority.
