The fact that we may hear or read in the media that broad access to abortion (implicitly, of course, on demand) should be guaranteed in Poland does not mean that this claim has any basis in international law currently in force. On the contrary, the provisions adopted by the international community over the years have repeatedly confirmed that states are obliged to protect the right to life to which every human being is entitled. Below, we list only the main sources of such obligation.

International law does not recognize access to abortion as a human right.

International law does not recognize a right to abortion. All the more so, it cannot be considered a “right” that takes precedence over the right to life. Generally, international legal instruments—based on universal standards of civilization—recognize the right to life as the first and most fundamental human right, and within the provisions related to the right to life, they do not include clauses limiting that right. Hierarchically, therefore, the right to life is the first, the most important and fundamental right, constituting at the same time a necessary condition for the existence and actual exercise of all other individual rights. It is indeed obvious that a person must exist and be alive in order to exercise, for example, the right to the protection of health or the right to make decisions about their personal life—rights so often borne on the banners of pro-abortion demonstrations.

Does a lie repeated many times become the truth?

Current attempts to establish abortion as a human right are based mainly on articulating such a claim within non-binding documents, standards, recommendations, guidelines, position statements, and guides, that is, instruments of soft law. They serve to prepare the ground for the future adoption of an international standard recognizing abortion as a human right, or to pretend such a right already exists, although it does not. In fact, the language used in these documents is clearly intended to create the belief that abortion is already part of the human rights protection system. This claim, however, has no basis in binding legal acts.

At the same time, today’s pro-abortion narrative is based on an attempt to separate abortion from the right to life and to link it with health-related rights (“sexual and reproductive health”) or the self-determination of individual persons, excluding any connection between terminating a pregnancy and the life of another human being—the developing child.

International law protects life

Numerous provisions of international treaties confirm that it is the right to life, rather than access to abortion, that is protected under international law. These include, in particular:

  1. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948. It was the first international document to unequivocally affirm the unrestricted right to life of every human being. It is already stated in the preamble that “recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice, and peace in the world.” Furthermore, Article 3 of the Declaration provides that “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.” And it is clear that any being with a human genome is already a human being before birth and remains a human being after birth.

The foregoing understanding of the right to life is consistent with the accepted principles of international treaty interpretation. Article 31 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, done at Vienna on May 23, 1969, concerning the general rule of interpretation, provides that “A treaty shall be interpreted in good faith in accordance with the ordinary meaning to be given to the terms of the treaty in their context and in the light of its object and purpose.” That ordinary meaning should be interpreted bearing in mind the fact that, at the time the Declaration was adopted, almost all countries prohibited the killing of human beings at the prenatal stage of development, and this was in application of how the phrase “everyone has the right to life” was understood.

  1. Article 6(1) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) provides that: “Every human being has the inherent right to life. This right shall be protected by law. No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his life.” According to the ICCPR, the right to life is inherent in every human being; it therefore belongs to all people at every stage of their development.

The fact that the right to life guaranteed by the ICCPR is inherent means that it is independent of the will of the legislator. International bodies, therefore, cannot grant it to anyone or take it away – they can only confirm it and protect it. This right derives from the very fact of being a human being. It comes into being with the emergence of the human being, whose beginning is marked by the moment of conception. The ICCPR does not assign different values to the lives of individual human beings, for example on the basis of age, holding that everyone has an equal right to life. Article 6 does not contain the phrase “from birth” nor any wording equivalent to it. Any other interpretation would be inconsistent with the prohibition of discrimination on the basis of birth or status contained in Articles 24 and 26 of the Covenant.

Additional confirmation of the aforementioned position is provided by Article 6(5) of the ICCPR, which prohibits carrying out the death penalty on a pregnant woman. This provision is a consequence of recognizing the independent status of the unborn child with respect to its mother. Documents from the preparatory work on the Covenant clearly indicate that the main reason why the death penalty should not be carried out on pregnant women is saving the life of an innocent child and out of “consideration for the interests of the unborn child.”

  1. The preamble to the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child explicitly guarantees the right to life of the unborn child, stating that the child, by reason of his physical and mental immaturity, needs special safeguards and care, including appropriate legal protection, before as well as after birth.” We also find confirmation of this provision in the Declaration of the Rights of the Child of November 20, 1959, to which the preamble of the Convention refers.

Article 1 of the Convention also defines a child as “every human being below the age of eighteen years unless under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier.” Thus, it sets the upper age limit by which a person is considered a child, while not establishing any lower limit. Accordingly, it is reasonable to assume that the provisions of the Convention also afford protection to unborn children from the very beginning of their existence (conception).

  1. The Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, known as the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). It is a binding document for the member states of the Council of Europe that contains no limitations regarding the scope of the right to life. Article 2 of the Convention provides: Everyone’s right to life shall be protected by law. No one shall be deprived of his life intentionally save in the execution of a sentence of a court following his conviction of a crime for which this penalty is provided by law.” Documents from the preparatory work confirm that, among other things, the right to life is a right enjoyed by virtue of the very fact of existence.

In a series of its judgments the European Court of Human Rights has indicated that abortion is not a right under the ECHR: there is no right to abortion (see ECtHR judgment of 26 October 2004 in Silva Monteiro Martins Ribeiro v. Portugal, application no. 16471/02), there is no right to have it performed (see ECtHR judgment of 5 October 1985 in Jean-Jacques Amy v. Belgium, application no. 11684/85), and the introduction by a State of a ban on abortion, in itself, does not constitute a violation of the Convention (see ECtHR judgment of 26 October 2004 in Silva Monteiro Martins Ribeiro v. Portugal).

  1. The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union provides, in its Article 2, that “[e]veryone has the right to life.” No one shall be condemned to the death penalty, or executed.” Here too, there is no basis for concluding that any group of persons is excluded from this protection. Quite the contrary, the wording of the article is not coincidentally similar to the provisions of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

Limited competences of the European Union

Amid numerous criticisms from European Union bodies over the lack of access to “on-demand” abortion in Poland, it should be remembered that the European Union has no competence to interfere in the Member States’ health policies. In accordance with Articles 6 and 168 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), the issue of so-called “sexual and reproductive health”, which is often understood by the pro-abortion lobby as covering what they now call “abortion care” [sic], does not fall within the scope of the Union’s action concerning health policies, and, in any case, “Union action shall respect the responsibilities of the Member States for the definition of their health policy and for the organization and delivery of health services and medical care.” Article 6 TFEU provides an exhaustive list of the areas in which the European Union has competence to support, coordinate, or supplement the actions of the Member States. This catalog includes, among other things, the protection and improvement of human health. However, these actions do not include the possibility of demanding that a Member State adopt specific solutions or of exerting pressure on it in this regard. As stated in this article, the Union shall only “have competence to carry out actions to support, coordinate or supplement the actions of the Member States.”

Summary

  • Human life is a fundamental right protected by international law. The protection of human biological existence is also a prerequisite for an individual to be able to enjoy other rights recognized by the international community (e.g., the right to the protection of health).
  • No binding instrument of international law imposes an obligation on states to legalize abortion to any extent, leaving the decision on this matter exclusively to individual states.
  • There are, on the other hand, numerous international instruments that fully respect the right to life and oblige States Parties to protect it. Poland has ratified a number of such international agreements and is bound by their provisions.
  • In the area of national health policies (including the regulation of abortion), the European Union has only supporting powers and cannot seek to harmonize the law in the Member States. Member States retain discretion in this regard.

Attorney Katarzyna Gęsiak – Director of the Ordo Iuris Center for Medical Law and Bioethics.

Source of cover photo:  Adobe Stock