“It would be great if akhunds were also raising awareness on this issue. And I believe they are doing it,” Amiraslanov said.
Of course, it was strange to hear this from a person representing the parliament of a secular state. On the other hand, such statements were to be expected. Ten years ago, the issue of sex-selective abortions in Azerbaijan was included in the draft law “On Family Planning and Reproductive Health”. It was proposed to penalize doctors who perform sex-selective abortions with suspension from medical practice, fines, and criminal prosecution. But all these punishments and restrictions, no matter how severe they were, did not have the desired effect. Sadly, the number of sex-selective abortions in Azerbaijan has not decreased. MPs and lawmakers were determined, but there was a lack of consistency and effective mechanism to combat this evil. It is not surprising that today Amiraslanov hopes for the help of the clergy. And, as we know, religion says that abortion is a horrible sin.
We have caught up with and surpassed China
Meanwhile, Azerbaijan ranks first among the countries most frequently practicing sex-selective abortions. According to 2021 statistics, there are 115 boys for every 100 girls in Azerbaijan.
China used to be the leader in sex-selective abortions, while Azerbaijan ranked second. It should be noted that in China selective abortions are prohibited by law and a doctor can face imprisonment for telling the parents the sex of the child. However, abortion as such remains legal, which means that the practice of sex-selective abortion is difficult to prove. At the end of 2022, China had 110.3 boys for every 100 girls, while the biological norm for the sex ratio of children at birth is 102 to 106. Today, Azerbaijan is “ahead of the curve”, as they say.
In October this year, Farid Babayev, Head of the Country Office of the UN Population Fund in Azerbaijan, said that if the global distortion of sex ratio of children being born in Azerbaijan continues, by 2050 the number of boys born every year will exceed the number of newborn girls by 12,000-15,000, and the sharp increase in the number of males in the society may lead to serious consequences: gender inequality, violence, early marriages, human trafficking, and crime growth.
According to him, there are several ways out of the current stalemate: first, ramping up awareness raising and making certain changes in the legislation.
But this has been and still is being discussed in government agencies, including the State Committee for Family, Women and Children’s Affairs. They constantly say that one of the most effective methods of combating this problem is education and awareness of the population, especially adolescents and young people, about healthy lifestyles, reproductive health and family planning, shaping safe reproductive habits, and preventing abortions.
Causes and effects
But if government officials are powerless in the face of this problem, it is time for journalists to sound the alarm. Human rights activists should also shout at the top of their voices; instead of just hinting at making some changes in the legislation, they should demand that sex-selective abortions be banned. And it is essential to hold accountable not only the doctors, but also the parents who order the murder of their unborn children.
A girl is a symbol of so-called “ill-being”, according to shallow members of society, as opposed to a boy—a successor to the family, protector and provider. These people will never realize that with the murder of each girl in the womb something much more than just a life is cut short. Every unborn girl, had she come into the world, could have been a mother too.
Lala Akhundova, gynecologist at the Republican Perinatal Center, says she has been refusing to perform abortion on her patients for many years.
“This dawned on me when my own daughter, after getting married, experienced several miscarriages in a row and was unable to get pregnant. Seeing her suffering, I realized that this was Heaven’s ‘payback’ for denying babies the chance to come into the world. Knowing that a baby’s heart begins to beat on the 21st day after conception, I began to see things differently. Repentance came over me, I started going to mosque, I made two pilgrimages to Mecca, and, most importantly, I stopped practicing abortion, even if it was prescribed by a doctor as a necessary measure. I heal women, restore them, prepare them for new births. Heaven heard me and accepted my repentance. And today I am the grandmother of a 4-year-old granddaughter, whom my daughter named Maryam. I knew it would be a girl, because at least one soul had to return to me as my granddaughter. And she did. I want to appeal to all women who are about to become mothers: either you are a mother, or do not even try to have children if you are not consciously ready for this step. Do not stain your hands with blood and your soul with black evil. When you plan to kill a baby, you are killing God in your heart,” she says.
Amina Selimkhanova, gynecologist at Shashama Aleskerova Clinical Maternity Hospital, says that their hospital does not practice telling the sex of the child to the parents at all.
“This rule applies to all our doctors, as per the hospital’s bylaws. We perform abortions only for medical reasons, we do not welcome sex-selective abortions and we do not perform such procedures. I myself am a mom of two daughters and I don’t think that a girl is a bad thing. Ignorance in society must be eradicated, all this nonsense about a daughter not being a permanent member of the family is prejudice and nothing more. I am telling you this as a mother,” Amina Selimkhanova says.
Leyla Mirhasanova, obstetrician-gynecologist at Maternity Hospital No. 5, said in an interview with Minval.az that she is not against abortion, as long as it is not sex-selective.
“There is such a thing as an unplanned pregnancy. And it is better to terminate it than to do even worse to the already born child: to throw it in the trash, to drown or strangle it, to abandon it. It is better to terminate the pregnancy at the earliest possible stage, but this is not a guarantee that the woman will remain healthy after it and will not lose reproductive function. There is no such thing as a safe abortion! Artificial termination of pregnancy may lead to reproductive dysfunction with the subsequent development of hormone-dependent diseases such as endometriosis, uterine myoma, dysfunctional bleeding, mastitis, hyperplastic processes and precancerous conditions. The best way to avoid unplanned pregnancy is to use protection. I believe that this should be taught in schools, and the national mindset should not be a hindrance in matters of sexual literacy,” Mirhasanova said.
The number of unborn girls is in the millions
According to a large-scale study published in the journal of the American National Academy of Sciences, a total of about 23 million girls never arrived in this world simply because their parents wanted a boy and terminated the pregnancy as soon as they learned of the baby’s future, unwanted, sex. 23 million girls have become victims of infanticide.
Situations leading to sex-selective abortions vary: for example, the procedure may be for medical reasons if the fetus is found to have a genetic disorder or disease and the parents realize that they are not ready to raise such a child. Sex-selective abortions may be linked to assisted reproductive technologies such as IVF: in the case of multiple pregnancies, a couple may choose to discard one embryo for certain reasons so as not to impede the development of other embryos. However, most often such abortions in countries where historically boys are valued more than girls are done precisely on the basis of sex, which is made possible by diagnostics. There is even a name for this: female infanticide, i.e., the killing of newborn girls.
It is not easy to identify sex-selective abortions, since women often conceal the reasons why they decide to kill a girl. Nevertheless, there are signs that can give a rough indication of the prevalence of sex-selective abortion in a country.
According to UN Population Fund statistics, between 102 to 106 boys should be born for every 100 girls, a ratio that is considered the biological norm. If many more boys than girls are born in a country, it may mean that there is a preference for children of one sex.
Yes, the problem of gender inequality is still relevant in Azerbaijan. There is still a large part of society here, where the birth of a girl makes the parents sad and family members sympathetic, while the birth of a boy is a cause for joy and celebration. In many families, girls are considered an extra mouth to feed, a burden. In such families, parents deliberately do not give their daughters education, and when those daughters grow up, they try to get rid of them as soon as possible, marrying them off to the first takers.
Our country has been raising the issue of combating sex-selective abortions for years now, moreover, there were even attempts at the legislative level to prohibit doctors from telling the parents the sex of the child during ultrasound, which, according to lawmakers, should have reduced the statistics of sex-selective abortions. But so far this ban remains only on paper, and words, as it often happens, do not match the actions. Everyone just talks, but they might as well talk to the wind, while each wasted word helps to kill girls in their mothers’ wombs.
P.S. Many countries around the world have symbolic memorials to children who never got to see the light of the world. Translucent glass angels hold out their hands to kneeling crying women who could have become mothers, but for certain reasons decided to get rid of their baby. And since today we are “ahead of the curve”, if we are officially at the top of the list of leaders in sex-selective abortion, such a memorial should be installed in every district of our country as a reminder that a fragile glass girl could have been born into the world and become a mom. But her mom and dad, sadly, willingly condemned their unborn daughter to death.
Yana Madatova
Translated from Minval.az
