Bill to ease laws on abortion wins nod

Uruguay’s Senate voted to ease the country’s tough abortion laws, although President Tabare Vazquez has vowed to veto any legislation that seeks to decriminalize the procedure. Women in the country are allowed to have an abortion only if they were raped or if the pregnancy endangers their lives.

The vote in one house of the bicameral legislature gave preliminary approval to a bill that would allow abortion in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy on grounds that include economic or social hardship or “circumstances linked to how the conception took place.”