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 News Around the Republic of Mexico | May 2007 
Mayor Ebrard Vows to Defend New Abortion Law
 Alberto Cuenca - El Universal
| | Marcelo Ebrard Casaubon, Mayor of Mexico City addresses a session of the C40 Large Cities Climate Summit in New York Wednesday, May 16, 2007. Fifteen cities around the world will begin cutting carbon emissions by renovating city-owned buildings with green technology under a program spearheaded by former U.S. President Bill Clinton's foundation. Major global banking institutions have committed US$1 billion (?750 million) to finance the upgrades of municipal buildings in participating cities, which include New York, Chicago, Houston, Toronto, Mexico City, London, Berlin and Tokyo. (AP/David Karp) |
Mexico City Mayor Marcelo Ebrard on Saturday emphatically declared that his government would defend the new abortion law against charges of unconstitutionality filed with the Supreme Court.
Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) and Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) lawmakers who backed the legislation also criticized the national ombudsman and the federal government for filing the briefs.
"We will file all the arguments in our defense to demonstrate that we did not overstep our authority in decriminalizing abortion during the first 12 weeks of gestation," Ebrard said on the sidelines of a local event commemorating International Women´s Health Day. "We will win this case."
Last week, the National Human Rights Commission filed a petition with the Supreme Court asking that the new law be overturned. Its principal argument was that the Constitution declares that all matters of public health are the purview of the federal government.
The federal Attorney General´s Office (PGR) joined the injunction on Friday. The PGR based its argument on a constitutional stipulation that life begins at conception and, as such, the unborn child is guaranteed protection under the law.
The PGR brief essentially says the Mexico City law violates an embryo´s right to life.
The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to consider the petitions and this week will announce whether or not it will formally accept the case.
Víctor Hugo Círigo, the PRD leader in the Mexico City Legislative Assembly, on Saturday said he was confident the law would be upheld.
"I think the court is being formalistic in allowing the CNDH and the government to make its initial case," he said. "But I don´t think it will overturn the law. Their decisions are usually very prudent and they are respectful of the autonomy of local institutions."
A few federal lawmakers expressed disappointment that the cases were filed, saying it only served to make a controversial issue more complicated.
"The intervention of the federal government and the CNDH will just make the debate more confrontational," said National Action Party Sen. José Julián Sacramento Garza.
PRD Dep. Luis Sánchez Jiménez suggested that the CNDH decision "proves that the ombudsman was pressured by the federal government to file a brief." |
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