Vatican daily rebukes Italian government on abortion pill

The Vatican newspaper yesterday criticised comments by Italy's Health Minister in favour of the abortion pill, setting the tone for a debate with the new centre-left government over its proposed social policies.

L'Osservatore Romano called the RU-486 abortion pill a weapon to carry out "carefree murder", speaking out for the second time in as many days against two of Romano Prodi's women ministers, less than a week after they were sworn in.

On Monday, the newspaper said a proposal by Family Minister Rosy Bindi, a Catholic, to discuss some kind of legal recognition for civil unions was "indefensible".

Yesterday, it took issue with Health Minister Livia Turco, who said she favoured controlled trials of the abortion pill, which is not available for general use in Italy, as a "safe and alternative method" to terminate an unwanted pregnancy.

The pill, also known as Mifepristone and in use in about 30 countries, blocks the action of the hormone progesterone, needed to sustain a pregnancy.

"The haste in which new ministers are lining up to assert their intentions on particularly sensitive themes is disconcerting," L'Osservatore said in an editorial.

"It's feminism we frankly did not feel the need for," it said.

Nearly 30 years since it was legalised in 1978 despite fierce Vatican opposition, abortion remains a sensitive issue in traditionally Roman Catholic Italy.

Ms Turco's predecessor in Silvio Berlusconi's centre-right government halted experiments with the RU-486 and recommended the presence of pro-life activists in state-funded advisory clinics to discourage abortion.

Pope Benedict has also spoken against the abortion pill, as well as against any move to recognise civil partnership for unwed heterosexual and gay couples.

The Church still holds considerable sway in Italy and last year scored a victory against attempts to dismantle the country's strict law on assisted fertility.

The centre left has in the past accused the Vatican of interfering in Italy's domestic affairs, but Prof. Prodi's broad coalition, which stretches form Roman Catholic moderates to communists, is far from united on abortion and civil unions.

The centre right also condemned Ms Turco's comments yesterday.