MADRID - The Spanish government has threatened to take legal action against a conservative-led region if it doesn’t scrap new rules aimed at discouraging women from seeking abortions.

Leaders in the Castilla y Leon region, just north of Madrid, late last week announced new measures that give pregnant women weighing an abortion the option of listening to their foetuses’ heartbeat or watching their ultrasound. 

As criticism mounted over the weekend, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez - a socialist who’s been in power since 2018 and is trailing conservatives in the polls - said he was ready to intervene.

“The government will take the necessary action to prevent non-compliance of the current law and setbacks in women’s rights,” Health Minister Carolina Darias told state-run television TVE on Monday. 

Spain was staunchly conservative when it emerged from dictatorship in the late 1970s, and is now one of Europe’s most progressive democracies.

It liberalised its reproductive laws over a decade ago to allow abortion up until the 14th week of pregnancy. A requirement for 16- and 17-years to secure parental consent to have the procedure is likely to be lifted next month. 

Most Spaniards don’t oppose abortion, according to the most recent surveys.

But with regional and municipal votes set for May ahead of a general election later this year, social issues like this one are becoming increasingly politicised.

And although a similar divide between liberals and conservatives is hardening across the rest of the European Union, the Castilla y Leon rules are the only example of an attempt to rollback abortion rights in Western Europe since the US Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe vs Wade, according to Ms Keina Yoshida, a legal adviser at the Centre for Reproductive Rights. 

“What we see in this Spanish region is a reminder that we should not take the protection of abortion rights for granted,” Ms Yoshida said. 

Just after the US ruling in June, French President Emmanuel Macron said he wanted safe and legal access to abortion added to the European Charter of Fundamental Rights.

France has since inched closer to enshrining those rights in its own constitution.

Poland and Hungary, meanwhile, have made it harder for women to get abortions, and in Italy, there are fears that new right-wing Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni will follow suit.

The Castilla y Leon measures, which came into effect on Monday, are reminiscent of steps taken by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

His government wrote a new constitution in 2011 guaranteeing that “the life of a foetus will be protected from conception”, then in September announced a decree that forces women to listen to their unborn child’s heartbeat before an abortion.

“The anti-abortion movement in Europe gained power and momentum after what happened in the United States,” said Ms Karolina Szopa, a lecturer with Bournemouth University who specialises in human rights.

“The strategy of these groups is to make abortion more difficult and restrict access before moving for legal restrictions.”  

In Spain, a national healthcare workers organisation, called the Federation of Associations for the Defence of Public Health, was among those that weighed in with criticism.

“We totally reject these measures that involve subjecting women to intolerable pressure and humiliation,” it said in a statement.

They are “a violation of laws such as patient autonomy, the right to privacy and respect for their decisions”.

The Popular Party - the majority partner in Castilla y Leon and the main opposition party nationally - stressed that the new measures won’t be mandatory and vowed to move ahead.

So did Regional Vice-President Juan Garcia-Gallardo, a senior member of the far-right Vox party, the minority partner.

In a Twitter post on Monday, he said that the central government was trying to fabricate a scandal to divert attention from real problems caused by the country’s mismanagement and that it is afraid of mothers having more information about their pregnancies.

Mr Garcia-Gallardo also vowed to protect the right of public doctors to refuse to perform an abortion, as “conscientious objectors”.

Political science professor Irene Delgado of UNED University in Madrid said the dispute highlights the high level of polarisation in Spanish politics. 

She added that it also “shows the campaign is in full swing ahead of the regional vote, which will be a bellwether for the general election”. BLOOMBERG