UN rights panel urges Italy to ensure abortion (2)

(ANSA) - Rome, March 28 - The United Nations Human Rights Committee on Tuesday called on Italy to ensure abortion services, saying it was "concerned for the difficulty of access to legal abortions because of the number of doctors who refuse to practise terminations because of reasons of conscience". The panel voiced concern over the widespread presence of conscientious objectors across the country and therefore "the significant number of back-street abortions". It said "the State should adopt necessary measures to guarantee the free and timely access to legal abortion services". Women's rights group regularly complain over the difficulty of abortion access in Italy due to the high proportion of doctors who object to performing abortions because if goes against their Christian consciences.