No Safe Harbor

• Share

After nearly two weeks of fruitless efforts to dock in Portugal, a Dutch "abortion ship" gave up and headed home — accompanied by the two Portuguese navy gunboats that had been its escort since the conservative government barred it on Aug. 27. But Rebecca Gomperts, head of Women on Waves, the group that runs the boat and had planned to distribute the RU-486 abortion pill on board, said it accomplished its main objective of "bringing the abortion issue to the fore."

The Borndiep's offshore stay certainly made headlines — helped by Gomperts' appearance on Portuguese TV to explain how to induce an abortion using over-the-counter medicines. Abortion in Portugal is banned except in very limited circumstances, although an estimated 20,000 to 40,000 women have illegal terminations each year. Antiabortion campaigners called for Gomperts to face charges of inciting abortion.

But the Borndiep was welcomed by pro-choice groups and opposition MPs. "The boat reinforced support for Portuguese women," Odette Santos, a Communist Party parliamentary deputy who is sponsoring a new bill to legalize abortion, told TIME. Santos does not expect her bill to pass, or any real change to take place until after parliamentary elections in 2006. But at least the Borndiep let the debate set sail.