Russia REPENTS of the slaughter of the unborn

MOSCOW, Aug. 23 — Hesitantly and with little public debate, Russia has increased its restrictions on abortion for the first time in nearly half a century.

Russia's abortion regulations remain permissive — there are still no limits on abortions in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy — but the new restrictions appear to reflect the first stirrings of a wider debate here over the morality of abortion, as well as the effect abortions are having on women's health and on the demographic future of Russia.

Ever since 1955, when the Soviet Union lifted a ban that had been imposed by Stalin in 1936, abortion here has been a common and widely accepted means of birth control, giving Russia one of the highest abortion rates in the world.

The collapse of the Soviet Union and with it the increased availability of contraceptives has resulted in a substantial decline in abortions in Russia — from a high of 4.6 million in 1988 to 1.7 million last year. But now the Ministry of Health, under pressure from conservative lawmakers, has decided to reduce the number further through government-imposed restrictions on what has effectively been free and virtually unlimited access to abortion.

Before the new restrictions, which took effect on Aug. 11, women could receive an abortion between the 12th and 22nd weeks of their pregnancies by citing one of 13 special circumstances called "social indicators," including divorce, poverty, unemployment or poor housing.

The government's decision has reduced the number to four: rape, imprisonment, the death or severe disability of the husband or a court ruling stripping a woman of her parental rights. Being a single mother or a refugee is no longer reason enough to abort a pregnancy after the 12th week.

As before, pregnancies can still be aborted after 12 weeks on medical grounds, including severe disabilities of the fetus or a threat to the mother's life.

Considering how emotionally and politically charged the abortion issue is in America and other countries, the reaction to the government's decision — announced with little fanfare in Russia's equivalent of the Federal Register — has been strikingly subdued.

But some lawmakers and leaders of the Russian Orthodox Church have welcomed the change and vowed to continue fighting for greater restrictions through new legislation. That has raised concerns among some doctors and the Russia Family Planning Association that a woman's right to an abortion — basically a given here — could soon be curtailed.

"It's a first step," said Aleksandr C. Chuyev, a member of the lower house of Parliament, who introduced legislation earlier this year to ban all abortions after the 12th week and then took part in negotiations with the Ministry of Health on drafting the new restrictions.

He welcomed the restrictions, characterizing them as a compromise. He said he planned to sponsor a new bill this fall, during the campaign for parliamentary elections, that would give a human fetus the same rights as a child.

"Maybe then women will think more before they have an abortion," he said.

The nascent debate over abortion here has been influenced by a variety of factors, including the resurgence of religion and the growing influence of the Russian Orthodox Church after 70 years of official atheism under Soviet rule.

Russia's demographic crisis has also led to demands that steps be taken to reverse the declining population trend. Though the country's birth rate rose last year — to 9.8 births per 1,000 people from 9.1 the year before — the population over all is projected to continue to decline. For every 10 births in Russia, there are still nearly 13 abortions.

Few are calling for an outright ban on abortions, even within the church, said Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin, a spokesman for Patriarch Aleksy II. But the voices against abortion are growing. "I think this debate will continue on the political level," he said.