Georgia – Déa Kulumbegashvili on abortion drama April

Georgian filmmaker Déa Kulumbegashvili talks to us about the making of her abortion drama April and the role of cinema in the face of repressive systems

Feature by Stefania Sarrubba
21 Apr 2025

Like the home abortions carried out by its protagonist Nina, the making of April was shrouded in secrecy for writer-director Déa Kulumbegashvili. Flying under the radar isn’t easy when you’re “constantly followed by police”, she tells us ahead of her film’s UK release.

After her debut Beginning made waves during the pandemic, the Georgian filmmaker returned to her hometown, Lagodekhi, for her sophomore feature, which follows an obstetrician-gynecologist moonlighting as an abortionist. Terminating an unplanned pregnancy is legal in Georgia, but restrictions and stigma, particularly in more rural areas like Lagodekhi, hinder safe access to the procedure – hence the need for Kulumbegashvili's secrecy. “They knew I was making a film about a female doctor. But we could not say what it was really about,” she explains.

Continued: https://www.theskinny.co.uk/film/interviews/dea-kulumbegashvili-on-abortion-drama-april

21.04.2025

Scottish ministers accused of failing women who cannot get later abortions

Campaigners say ‘extremely vulnerable women’ are having to travel hundreds of miles to visit English clinics

Libby Brooks, Scotland correspondent
Mon 21 Apr 2025

Campaigners have warned Scottish ministers that they are failing in their legal and moral duties as growing numbers of “extremely vulnerable women” have to travel hundreds of miles south because they cannot access later-term abortions in Scotland.

Not one of Scotland’s 14 regional health boards provide abortion care after 20 weeks except in the specific cases of foetal abnormality or threat to a woman’s life. This is despite the Scottish government promising to rectify this “explicit inequality” three years ago, and abortion being legal on broad grounds until 24 weeks across the UK.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/apr/21/scottish-government-failing-women-who-cant-access-later-term-abortions-campaigners-say

‘A Love Letter To Malta’: Women Behind Abortion Play Open Up About Telling The Country What It Doesn’t Want To Hear

by Ana Tortell
April 20, 2025

Two Maltese women took to the stage to tell the untold stories of those living under one of the world’s harshest abortion bans.

Receiving rave reviews and international acclaim, Blanket Ban had two runs in the UK before creators and performers Marta Vella and Davinia Hamilton decided it was time to bring it to Malta.

Just after the show wrapped its local run, Lovin Malta sat down with the pair to learn more about the process and thought behind the powerful two-person play.

Continued: https://lovinmalta.com/theatre/a-love-letter-to-malta-women-behind-abortion-play-open-up-about-telling-the-country-what-it-doesnt-want-to-hear/

20.04.2025

Film, Art, Books

A love letter to Malta

European Citizens’ Initiative on abortion rights hits 1.2 million signatures

Saturday 19 April 2025
Brussels Times

The pro-choice movement for safe and accessible abortion in the EU reached about 1.2 million verified signatures last week surpassing the threshold required for European Citizens’ Initiatives to induce the European Commission to consider new legislative proposals.

To be successful, a European citizens' initiative (ECI), EU’s main instrument for participative democracy, has to reach one million statements of support as well as minimum thresholds in at least seven countries. The initiative My Voice My Choice exceeded the threshold less than a year after the collection of signatures started. The collection period ends on 24 April.

Continued: https://www.brusselstimes.com/eu-affairs/1542870/european-citizens-initiative-on-abortion-rights-hits-1-2-million-signatures

19.04.2025

European Citizens' Initiative on abortion

‘Care Is a Political Act’: MADRE’s Global Legacy of Organizing and Solidarity

4/18/2025
by Eleanor J. Bader

In the mid-1980s, neither Amnesty International nor Human Rights Watch considered rape a weapon of war or categorized sexual assault as a violation of human rights. But MADRE did. The 40-year-old, U.S.-based global feminist organization helped correct these egregious omissions.

The group’s legacy includes numerous other accomplishments: MADRE was one of the first domestic organizations to partner with international LGBTQ+ and Indigenous activists and was one of the first to analyze foreign policy through a feminist lens.

Continued; https://msmagazine.com/2025/04/18/care-is-a-political-act-madres-global-legacy-of-organizing-and-solidarity/

Faith, sorrow and rebirth: A quest for bodily autonomy

April 17, 2025
Dr. Michée Kanda, Health System Officer, Ipas Democratic Republic of Congo

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, access to comprehensive abortion care remains a taboo topic, enshrined in restrictive legal frameworks and rigid social norms. Although some progress has been made, cultural and religious barriers still prevent women and girls from accessing the information and care they need.

While safe medical solutions exist, their access is hampered by fear, lack of information and social rejection. In the absence of alternatives, many resort to dangerous methods or fall into depression, sometimes with tragic consequences such as suicide.

Continued: https://www.ipas.org/news/faith-sorrow-and-rebirth-a-quest-for-bodily-autonomy/

17.04.2025

News

bodily autonomy

Dr. Mboma

Ipas Democratic Republic of Congo

Kintambo Center of Excellence

Michée Kanda

Africa

Democratic Republic of Congo

Georgian Abortion Drama April Is Equal Parts Disturbing and Enthralling

By Brianna Zigler
April 17, 2025

A mother screaming in the throes of labor gives birth to a baby that is lifeless and pale, as Georgian director Déa Kulumbegashvili films an actual live birth that produces a stillborn. This stillbirth drives the bare bones narrative of Kulumbegashvili’s sophomore feature, April: a timely examination of women’s reproductive healthcare in the face of cultural repression. Abortion isn’t illegal in Georgia outright, not before the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. But Orthodox customs and attitudes foster a deep culture of shame toward not just abortion but birth control. As our own country sees the strides it had once made in women’s healthcare rolled back, mothers forced to illegally cross state lines in order to receive life-saving care, any perceived “backwards” mores of an Eastern European society can no longer be shrugged off as such by the Western world.

Our protagonist, Nina (Ia Sukhitashvili, star of Kulumbegashvili’s prior feature, Beginning) travels to remote villages administering under-the-table abortions; an open secret among Nina’s disapproving male colleagues.

Continued : https://www.pastemagazine.com/movies/dea-kulumbegashvili/april-movie-review-dea-kulumbegashvili-georgia-abortion-drama-reproductive-rights

17.04.2025

USA – Abortions Are Rising—Even After Dobbs. A New Book Explains Why.

“It’s a story of resistance and resilience and hope.”

Julianne McShane, Mother Jones
April 17, 2025

New data released this week reaffirmed a seemingly paradoxical reality of the post-Roe v. Wade era: Abortion rates have continued to rise despite the increasing restrictions nationwide.

The latest data, compiled by the abortion rights research and policy organization the Guttmacher Institute, shows that throughout 2024, clinicians provided more than one million abortions in states without total abortion bans, a slight increase compared to 2023. A closer look at the data reflects how healthcare providers and patients have adapted to changing circumstances—which have made access both more difficult and, in some ways, easier—since the Supreme Court’s June 2022 decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization revoking the constitutional right to abortion.

Continued: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/04/abortions-are-rising-even-after-dobbs-a-new-book-explains-why/

Nigeria – Safeguarding women’s lives: The urgent case for reinstating the Safe Termination Of Pregnancy guidelines–IRISE

April 15, 2025

Initiative to Resist Institutional Slavery and Exploitation (IRISE) has expressed the urgent need for the reinstatement of the Safe Termination Of Pregnancy guidelines

In a press release signed by the Director, IRISE, Nigeria, Omodele Ibitoye Ejeh, the group justified their request adding that Women in Nigeria have continued to face multiple barriers including legal restrictions.

Continued: https://authorityngr.com/2025/04/15/safeguarding-womens-lives-the-urgent-case-for-reinstating-the-safe-termination-of-pregnancy-guidelines-irise/

15.04.2025

News

Initiative to Resist Institutional Slavery and Exploitation

IRISE

Omodele Ibitoye Ejeh

Safe Termination of Pregnancy guideline

More than 100 anti-abortion protesters target Glasgow hospital

Apr 14, 2025
By Gemma Clark

MORE than 100 anti-abortion protesters gathered near Glasgow's Queen Elizabeth University Hospital on Sunday evening. The event was part of the Texas-based group 40 Days for Life’s efforts to "pray to end abortion" around the world.

… Sunday's protest demonstrates just how close anti-abortion activists can still get to hospitals, and serves as a reminder of how modest the original buffer zone proposals were.

Continued: https://www.thenational.scot/news/25088171.100-anti-abortion-protesters-target-glasgow-hospital/

14.04.2025