Rising Number of Iranian Mothers Committing Infanticide During Unwanted Pregnancies

Sara.K., FCN News Agency: While comprehensive official statistics are not available, scattered reports from various regions of Iran indicate an increase in the killing of beings that are murdered by their own mothers.

Mothers who become pregnant against their will and, perhaps despite their attachment to the being growing within them, resort to killing it.

According to FCN News Agency, recently the head of Tehran’s Legal Medicine Organization reported the registration of 950 requests for legal abortion in the province, of which only one-third received legal authorization. In other words, more than 600 Tehran mothers sought to kill their children within a single month.

Based on law, abortion permission in Iran is only issued when pregnancy poses a life-threatening risk to the mother. However, this legal restriction has so far been unable to prevent the increase in illegal abortions in Iran.

Government Silence is a Sign of Indifference

Sudabeh Mekarem, a sociologist, in an interview with FCN News Agency emphasizes that to confront these heinous crimes in the country, the roots must be examined and deterrent tools must be utilized.

She views government silence in the face of rising abortion in the country as a sign of indifference by the ruling authorities.

In her opinion, the absence of official statistics on this matter amounts to erasing the face of the problem and abandoning society to its own devices. This occurs while abortion can result from problems such as economic difficulties, promotion of corruption and illicit relations, and particularly from clandestine and temporary marriages known as Sigheh.

Sudabeh, enumerating some observable realities in Iran, continues: In recent decades, inauspicious phenomena such as the weakening of family bonds, the weakening of religious and traditional perspectives of girls toward premarital sexual relations, the growth of prostitution, and the tendency to flee home in Iran have become more prominent. Unfortunately, the government sector has remained silent in the face of such bitter realities and only pursues coercive and administrative measures.

Meanwhile, we have witnessed that official abortion statistics were last announced in 1998, which reported a ten percent increase in abortion in the country.

According to the Negar website and according to Mohammad Ismail Motlagh, the former director general of the office of health and family population at the Ministry of Health schools, according to the aforementioned statistics, approximately 90,000 fetuses are aborted annually in the country both legally and illegally; that is, on average 221 fetuses per day and 9 fetuses per hour.

Of this number, 80,000 abortions were performed illegally. This official concluded that it is estimated that currently approximately 120,000 illegal abortions are performed annually in the country.

Now some unofficial statistics suggest that at least 56 percent of Iranian youth have been in a relationship with a girl, 26 percent of whom have engaged in illicit relations, and 13 percent of these relations have led to unwanted pregnancy and abortion.

According to official statistics, 26.3 percent of our country’s population of 80 million and 307 thousand people are youth. With rough calculation and in the most optimistic scenario, it can be concluded that more than 30,000 fetuses are aborted annually in Iran.

The Growth of Abortion as a Result of Government Performance

Mina, a Tehran resident, while acknowledging the growth of abortion in the country, emphasizes in an interview with FCN News Agency that authorities take no action to combat abortion. Because they prefer to pretend that in our Islamic country no corruption and immoral acts are visible.

Mina believes that part of illegal abortions in Iran have resulted from the elimination of free contraceptive methods. Another part is the result of secret marriages of married men seeking variety with defenseless women who resort to prostitution for livelihood, without intending to engage in prostitution.

In this citizen’s view, both these grounds for promoting abortion have been expanded by the Islamic government. Because emphasis on childbearing without regard to people’s economic problems and the legality of polygamy for men, alongside the absence of support solutions for unprotected women, is among the achievements of the Islamic Republic regime.

Mina, referring to the multiplicity of secret abortion centers in Tehran, says: “The increase in demand for abortion drugs in Nasserkhosrow and the influx of pregnant mothers to unsanitary centers for abortion using unsafe methods reflects a bitter reality in Islamic Iran. A reality that speaks of the growth of violence and the fading of motherly affection and paternal responsibility, which authorities have simply ignored.”

This citizen, however, believes that the consequences of treating these massacres as ordinary will affect all Iranian society and are subject to divine punishment.