Peregraf- Ghamgin Mohammed
Runak Sardar could not do anything for her unborn child. The difficulties became apparent at the end of the first trimester when a medical examination turned all the joys of carrying her third child into hesitation and fear.
"I was three months pregnant with my baby when my doctor told me it wasn’t OK and I needed to have an abortion," Sardar told Peregraf.
By fourteen weeks, the fetus has developed enough that any serious health problems can be diagnosed by a doctor. It was clear that Sardar’s baby would be born with major birth defects and that there was no hope of recovery.
"In some cases, doctors in the Kurdistan Region and Iraq are forced to perform an abortion because of the lack of treatment for some serious diseases," Leila Ali, a gynecologist and obstetrician, told Peregraf.
Abortion is currently prohibited under Iraqi law, except in the case of serious medical problems that put the mother’s life in danger or where the fetus is sure to die after birth. This assessment must be endorsed by an expert medical committee.
Sardar’s situation met these qualifications. The danger to the fetus was compounded by her medical history. Her two older children were themselves born with birth defects. Ultrasounds showed that her latest pregnancy involved similar complications.
"Although three doctors said I should have an abortion, I didn't want to do it. I decided to stay at home, not see any doctor anymore, and pray to God to keep my baby safe," Sardar said.
There are no public statistics about abortion, either in Iraq as a whole or the Kurdistan Region in particular. Peregraf requested data from the Ministry of Health and the Kurdistan Regional Statistics Board, but they were turned down.
The Kurdistan Region does not have a special law regarding abortion and relies on the Iraqi Penal Code. According to Article 417, any woman who willfully procures her own abortion or helps another to get one can be punished with up to one year in prison.
Unauthorized abortion providers also face a year in prison if convicted. If the pregnant woman dies during the procedure, those involved can be sentenced to seven years in prison.
Under the law, a harsher punishment can be imposed if the unauthorized provider is a doctor, pharmacist, chemist, midwife, or one of their assistants. If a woman gets an abortion for a pregnancy that resulted from an affair, the court will view that as a mitigating circumstance.
Under Article 418, those convicted of procuring an abortion without the consent of the pregnant woman face between ten and fifteen years in prison.
Nevertheless, there are few prosecutions in Iraq for what remains an extremely controversial practice. Indeed, abortion is prohibited under Islamic Law, which is recognized a key foundation of Iraqi law. There are some interpretations that permit an abortion if it is carried out within the first 40 days, but not after.
"There are cases of abortion every day and it is becoming a phenomenon. We should think about a special law for abortion. The law would solve all the current cases," lawyer Shokhan Abdullah told Peregraf.
He argued that an increase in the incidence of abortions would cause "the spread of family and social danger, the creation of children outside the family, the destruction of a person, and the deprivation of the right to life."
Earlier this summer, a video went viral which showed a number of plastic bottles that allegedly contained the remains of aborted fetuses that were found in a cemetery in Erbil.
However, Erbil Police spokesman Karzan Salih told Peregraf that they had "heard about this in the past, but there was no complaint about it. As police, we will investigate."
There was one complaint about abortion in Sulaimaniyah, according to Sarkawt Hassan, the governorate’s police spokesperson. It involved a husband who was upset that his estranged wife had an abortion after their divorce.
Three months after she made her decision not get an abortion, Sardar was now nearly six months pregnant. She resumed visiting her doctor. She hoped to hear that there has been an improvement, but the news is not good. Her doctor urged her to rethink her decision and seek a late-term procedure.
"When I came home, I cried a lot," she said. "I had no choice. When I looked at my other two children with disabilities, I was afraid that the new baby would be much worse and I wouldn't be able to raise them."
Faced with the medical evidence, she began to think that her initial decision had been wrong. With this heavy on her heart, she chose to go forward with the procedure.
There are 73 million abortions worldwide each year, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Six out of every ten unwanted pregnancies end in an abortion, as do 29 percent of all pregnancies.
While the procedure is safe and legal in many jurisdictions, 45 percent of abortions are conducted in an unsafe way "by untrained persons using dangerous and invasive methods." This happens primarily in developing countries and is a major cause of maternal mortality and physical, mental, and social problems.
"Some women who are married come and ask for an abortion for different reasons," Ali said. "Other people who are not married come for an abortion, which is prohibited by law and specialists do not do the abortion."
Others have abortions outside of a hospital context, which frequently result in complications, she added. According to this investigation, an illegal abortion can be obtained using pills or other methods starting at $800.
Sulaiman Sindhi, spokesman for the Independent Commission for Human Rights in the Kurdistan Region, told Peregraf that they had not received any complaints about abortions.
"The job of the Human Rights Commission is to investigate whether abortions consist of isolated cases or are a phenomenon. This is not the first time that abortion has occurred," he said.
Sardar made a difficult decision. She thought about it for a long time before having an abortion in a surgical hospital, of her own free will and supported by the expert medical committee.
However, she does regret it.
"I will never forgive myself. I carried him for six months, but then I had an abortion at the behest of the doctor," she said. "I saw with my own eyes that all his body parts were complete."