Thousands march in Ireland as abortion row spirals
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GALWAY (AFP) - Thousands of people took to the streets in Ireland on Saturday in a politically charged memorial for an Indian woman allegedly refused the termination of her pregnancy because it was against the law.
Ms Savita Halappanavar, a 31-year-old dentist originally from India, died in University Hospital Galway days after she miscarried. Her family say she asked for an abortion several times because she was in pain.
On Saturday more than 10,000 people attended a march in the Irish capital Dublin, police said, where a minute's silence was observed before pro-choice activists made speeches calling for legislative change.
In Galway on Ireland's west coast, where the Halappanavars lived and where her husband Praveen worked as an engineer, hundreds of people carrying candles took to the city's Eyre Square on a bitterly cold evening.
