I picked up a June 2015 issue of the Belfast Telegraph from the reception desk of the hostel and was surprised to read the article, “Abortion law is inhumane, court told”. Abortion is illegal in Northern Ireland regardless of the circumstances that resulted in the pregnancy of the woman, or the health of the fetus: “rape, incest, and serious malformations of the [fetus]”. The story covers a woman who had to travel to England in order to terminate her fetus that suffered from underdevelopment issues of the brain. She came to the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission with her case and they are now undergoing a legal case to repeal the 1861 abortion law, on the grounds that it is cruel and unusual punishment to force a woman to have a child against her will, and making her have to travel under such traumatic circumstances.

I found this particular article interesting because I assumed that abortion was legal here because Northern Ireland is part of the UK. It made sense to me to see anti life posters in the Republic because it is a predominately Catholic country, however, I would have thought Northern Ireland to be more progressive.