For Saba, a Syrian woman in her thirties whose name has been changed to protect her identity, discovering that she was pregnant was not simply a moment of joy. It came at a time when she was seriously considering separating from her husband, following two years of marriage marked by physical violence and restrictions on her movement and everyday life. Despite these circumstances, her desire to become pregnant and have a child had remained strong, although it had gradually begun to diminish as marital conflicts persisted and violence escalated.

The pregnancy test, however, revealed a result that contradicted the plans she had been making at the time. Saba recalls:

“When the second red line appeared on the positive pregnancy test, which I took three times, I forgot all the suffering I had experienced in my husband's home ... I was simply happy! ... It was one of the happiest days of my life. I felt the presence of the fetus, and I was overwhelmed by a joy unlike anything I had ever experienced before.”

These feelings did not last long. As her pregnancy progressed, Saba began questioning whether she could raise a child in a family environment where she herself had experienced violence and where severe restrictions were imposed on the lives of women and girls.

Initially, Saba held on to the possibility that her pregnancy might improve her marriage and allow her to build a family different from the environment in which she had lived. However, another confrontation with her husband forced her to face the realities of their relationship once again. He threatened and physically assaulted her, demanding that she terminate the pregnancy.

That threat marked a turning point in Saba's decision. No longer believing that she could build a stable family life with her husband, she decided to end both the relationship and the pregnancy.

Intimate partner violence intersects with decisions surrounding pregnancy and reproduction. The ability to determine whether a pregnancy should continue is shaped not only by personal desire but also by the nature of intimate relationships, the degree of safety within them, and the economic and social resources available to women.

Reproductive autonomy, therefore, cannot be measured merely by a woman's ability to say “yes” or “no,” but by the conditions that enable her to make such decisions without fear, threats, or coercion.

The concept of reproductive coercion provides a framework for understanding this relationship. It refers to behaviours through which an intimate partner attempts to control another person's reproductive decisions, whether by pressuring them to become pregnant, continue a pregnancy, terminate it, or by interfering with contraceptive use. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists identifies these behaviours as forms of reproductive and sexual coercion.

The situation becomes even more complicated when a woman seeking to terminate her pregnancy cannot access a clear legal and medical pathway through which to obtain care.

Abortion Under Syrian Law

Some of the historical roots of abortion criminalization in the legal systems governing Syrian territories can be traced to the Ottoman period, when the regulation of pregnancy and reproduction was connected, among other considerations, to legal and population policies intended to encourage childbirth, regarding population growth as a source of the state's economic and military strength.

The Ottoman Penal Code of 1858 addressed abortion under Articles 192 and 193, penalizing those responsible for causing abortions or providing the means to induce them, without directly criminalizing women who terminated their own pregnancies. However, a legislative amendment introduced in 1911 expanded criminal liability to include the pregnant woman herself, imposing sentences ranging from six months to three years of imprisonment. This historical development is documented in academic research on Ottoman criminal law and reproductive policies.

This legislative legacy continued to influence the legal landscape during the French Mandate in Syria, amid interactions between local legislation and European legal models. On 31 July 1920, France enacted legislation criminalizing incitement to abortion and the promotion of contraceptive methods, reflecting a pronatalist legislative approach that emerged following the First World War and its considerable human losses.

‍

Following independence, Syria's Penal Code was promulgated through Legislative Decree No. 148 of 22 June 1949 and entered into force in September of the same year. The legislation reorganized provisions concerning contraception and abortion under Articles 523–532, situated within the section addressing offences against public morality and decency.

Legal intervention did not begin with the act of abortion itself. It extended to the promotion and circulation of contraceptive methods before ultimately criminalizing women for terminating their pregnancies.

Under Articles 523 and 524, criminalized conduct included describing or disseminating contraceptive methods for promotional purposes under the conditions specified by law, as well as selling, offering for sale, possessing with intent to sell, or facilitating the use of contraceptive products. Article 523 prescribed imprisonment ranging from one month to one year, together with a fine, while Article 524 imposed the same penalties for the acts specified within its provisions.

Criminalization, therefore, was not limited to terminating pregnancies. It also encompassed activities involving methods that could enable women to prevent pregnancy in the first place.

The legal restrictions did not stop at contraception but extended to abortion-related methods themselves. Article 525 criminalized promotional activities intended to publicize, encourage, or facilitate the use of abortion methods, as defined in the provision, prescribing imprisonment ranging from two months to two years and a fine. Article 526 further extended criminal liability to the sale, offering for sale, possession with intent to sell, or facilitation of the use of substances intended to induce abortion.

The law thus went beyond penalizing those who performed abortions, extending criminalization to the promotion of abortion methods and the circulation of substances intended to induce them, within a legislative framework that subjected aspects of reproductive decision-making to legal control.

The criminalization of abortion itself was established under Article 527, which imposes imprisonment ranging from six months to three years on a woman who terminates her own pregnancy, whether through methods she uses herself or those administered by another person with her consent.

Article 528 further penalizes anyone who performs or attempts to perform an abortion with the woman's consent, prescribing imprisonment ranging from one to three years, with increased penalties where the abortion or the methods used result in the woman's death. These provisions appear in the published text of the Syrian Penal Code.

A woman's consent to terminate her pregnancy did not exempt her from punishment. Instead, the law subjected her to criminal liability even when the procedure was performed with her agreement.

The moral dimension of this legislation becomes particularly evident in Article 531, which provides a mitigating legal excuse for a woman who terminates her pregnancy to preserve what the law describes as her “honour.” This mitigating provision also extends to individuals who commit offences under Articles 528 and 529 to preserve the “honour” of a female descendant or relative within the second degree of kinship.

Here lies the contradiction: while the law recognizes the preservation of so-called “honour” as a legally relevant consideration that may reduce punishment for abortion, it does not recognize a woman's independent decision to terminate her pregnancy as a general ground for permitting the procedure.

This contradiction concerns more than the severity of punishment. It reflects the underlying legal conception of the relationship between women's bodies and state authority. Rather than recognizing women as independent decision-makers regarding their pregnancies, the legislation treats their bodies as subjects of legal regulation shaped, in certain provisions, by moral and social considerations.

By recognizing “honour” as grounds for mitigating punishment, the law attaches legal significance to concerns surrounding reputation and social control over sexual and reproductive behaviour, without extending equivalent recognition to women's reproductive autonomy.

The law, therefore, does not merely regulate abortion. It also determines which motivations deserve legal consideration and which are denied recognition as legitimate grounds for making decisions concerning women's bodies.

Lawyer Hussein al-Shabbat points to the difficulties involved in proving certain cases of induced abortion and distinguishing them from spontaneous miscarriage, noting that some abortion practices continue outside public view.

Within the Syrian context, where legal restrictions intersect with poverty, displacement, disrupted healthcare services, and social stigma, barriers to accessing safe medical care may become particularly severe.

The World Health Organization (WHO) emphasizes that restricting access to abortion does not reduce the number of abortions performed but substantially affects their safety.

Laws criminalizing abortion do not eliminate the need for it. Instead, they may push women to seek services outside established healthcare and protection systems, where risks increase and opportunities for accountability become more limited.

Medical Care: When Secrecy Becomes a Barrier to Protection

After making her decision, Saba attempted to access medical care to terminate her pregnancy. She recalls that several physicians refused to assist her before she eventually underwent the procedure at a hospital in a city in northeastern Syria, when she was seven weeks pregnant.

According to Saba, the procedure involved uterine curettage, performed through cervical dilation and the removal of tissue from the uterus.

Saba explains that her sister accompanied her to the hospital and was required to sign a document releasing the medical institution and physician from liability. According to her testimony, the document stated that she had been admitted because of severe vaginal bleeding, although she had not experienced any bleeding when she arrived.

“I entered the hospital accompanied by my sister, who was forced to sign a liability waiver for the hospital and the doctor,” Saba recalls.

She adds that the document referred to bleeding that had never occurred and that she entered the operating room without being informed in advance, according to her account, that the procedure would be performed under general anaesthesia.

Yet her suffering did not end when the procedure was completed.

Following the surgery, Saba experienced severe and unexplained pain, which she describes as so intense that it caused her to collapse to the ground.

Two days after the procedure, she attempted to contact the physician who had performed it to ask about her symptoms. According to Saba, he denied knowing her and instructed her to delete his phone number.

Saba was unable to return for follow-up care because the physician was located in another governorate. Unable to contact him and having found insufficient information or organizations that could provide assistance, she turned to the internet in an attempt to understand her symptoms and identify what might be causing them.

Her experience reveals another dimension of the risks associated with restricted access to abortion and post-abortion care. Obtaining a medical procedure does not necessarily guarantee continuity of care, particularly when women face geographical, legal, and social barriers that limit their ability to seek assistance or return to healthcare providers.

In Saba's case, these obstacles extended beyond the initial difficulty of accessing abortion. Following the procedure, she found herself experiencing symptoms for which she could obtain no medical explanation, leaving her dependent on information available online rather than a direct medical assessment.

When women are constrained by legal restrictions and social stigma, the problem extends beyond their ability to terminate a pregnancy. It also concerns their right to healthcare, information, and protection afterward, without fear or the necessity of confronting health risks alone.

In a related account, Dr. Bassam, a specialist in obstetrics and gynaecology, explains that some women resort to using medications to induce abortion, particularly misoprostol, outside formal medical care.

He emphasizes that the problem does not lie in the medication itself but in insufficient information regarding its use, uncertainty about appropriate dosages and potential complications, and limited access to medical counselling and healthcare.

Dr. Bassam warns about the potential risks associated with inappropriate medication use, including the possibility of an ongoing pregnancy following an attempted medication abortion.

He explains that some women may take substantial quantities of medication without achieving the intended outcome:

“They might take sixty pills and the pregnancy still continues, which is a very large dose. Because of the laws prohibiting abortion, I, as a physician, cannot help this woman terminate her pregnancy. Meanwhile, a black market for clandestine clinics flourishes.”

He adds that women unable to access physicians may turn to traditional birth attendants or folk remedies involving substances such as cinchona, senna, essential oils, and other preparations.

He warns that using medically inappropriate or unsafe methods to terminate pregnancy can result in serious complications, including bleeding, infections, uterine injuries, incomplete abortion, or an ongoing pregnancy, together with the associated health risks.

WHO guidance distinguishes unsafe methods from evidence-based medication abortion, including the use of misoprostol under appropriate conditions with access to accurate information and support.

When the Need for Healthcare Becomes an Opportunity for Exploitation

The potential risks are not confined to medical complications. Difficulties in accessing abortion services can also create circumstances that increase women's vulnerability to financial exploitation or sexual assault, particularly when their options are limited and they fear reporting abuse or losing access to care.

Malak al-Abed, a pseudonym for a Syrian woman in her thirties, recounts an experience of physical sexual harassment by a physician she approached for assistance in terminating her pregnancy.

Malak was the mother of four children and did not wish to have more, while her husband wanted to continue having children. Faced with this disagreement over family size, she began exploring options for terminating her pregnancy and eventually found an informal clinic.

According to her testimony, during a medical examination, she experienced unwanted physical contact that made her uncomfortable. This included inappropriate touching while receiving an injection in the buttock area, alongside other physical behaviours she described as unacceptable.

She adds that the physician asked to meet with her, behaviour that heightened her fear and discomfort.

Nevertheless, Malak felt unable to challenge his conduct or stop visiting the clinic. She feared losing what appeared to be her only available opportunity to terminate the pregnancy, given the limited alternatives and her concern about the pregnancy progressing further.

The Right to Have Children and the Right Not to Have Children

The debate surrounding abortion extends beyond the right to terminate a pregnancy. It also concerns the conditions necessary for reproductive decisions to be genuinely free.

From the perspective of reproductive justice, a framework developed by Black feminist activists in the United States during the 1990s, the freedom not to have children cannot be separated from the right to have children.

The reproductive justice framework, subsequently advanced by organizations such as SisterSong, connects reproductive autonomy to the social, economic, and political conditions in which reproductive decisions are made.

Within the Syrian context, the experiences of Saba and Malak reveal different dimensions of this issue.

Saba initially wanted to become a mother, but her violent marital relationship led her to reconsider that decision. Malak, meanwhile, faced difficulties in determining the number of children she wished to have.

In both cases, reproductive decision-making was inseparable from violence, social and economic constraints, and barriers to accessing healthcare.

Reproductive justice cannot be achieved merely by recognizing a woman's right to terminate a pregnancy. It also requires recognizing her right to have children without coercion, to remain child-free without punishment, and to raise her children in an environment free from violence and deprivation.

The WHO observes that legal restrictions do not reduce the incidence of abortion but do influence its safety. Consequently, criminalization does not eliminate the need to terminate pregnancies. Instead, the associated risks may be distributed unequally among women according to their economic and social resources and their ability to access safe healthcare.

Examining these risks through the lens of reproductive justice also exposes the limitations of approaches that frame abortion as an individual choice detached from its social and material conditions.

A woman experiencing domestic violence, one who is economically dependent on her partner, or one living in an area with inadequate healthcare services does not face the same circumstances as a woman who possesses the financial resources and practical ability to access medical care and protection.

Who Has the Authority to Decide What Happens to Women's Bodies?

More than seven decades after the enactment of Syria's Penal Code, and amid the political transformations unfolding in the country since December 2024, the question of abortion raises a broader issue concerning the place of women's bodily and reproductive autonomy in the future of Syrian legislation and institutions.

The issue is not merely whether a particular medical procedure should be permitted or prohibited. Rather, it concerns the multiple forms of authority that intervene in reproductive decisions, from families and intimate partners to physicians and the law itself, as well as the conditions that either enable or prevent women from exercising autonomy.

The significance of this question lies not in advocating legislative reform detached from social realities, but in reconsidering the structures that impose reproduction as a responsibility upon women while restricting their ability to determine its conditions or refuse it altogether.

Reproductive justice does not mean allowing the authorities to choose between pregnancy and abortion on behalf of women. It means ending the appropriation of women's right to decide and ensuring the conditions necessary for that right to be meaningfully exercised.

References

1. Syrian Arab Republic. (1949). Penal Code, Legislative Decree No. 148 of 22 June 1949, Articles 523–532.

2. “The Birth of Ottoman Penal Biopolitics: Motherhood, Pregnancy and Child-Protection in the Criminal Justice System (1850–1918).” (2025). Middle Eastern Studies, 61(2). A peer-reviewed academic study examining Ottoman criminal legislation, reproductive governance, and amendments to abortion-related provisions, including the 1911 amendment. 

3. French Republic. (1920). Loi du 31 juillet 1920 réprimant la provocation à l'avortement et à la propagande anticonceptionnelle [Law of 31 July 1920 Criminalizing Incitement to Abortion and Contraceptive Propaganda]. Official legislative record, Légifrance. Read the original French legislation.

4. World Health Organization. (2025). Abortion Care Guideline (2nd ed.). Geneva: World Health Organization. Authoritative clinical and policy guidance addressing evidence-based abortion care, legal barriers, service delivery, and post-abortion healthcare. Read the WHO guideline.

Translation Note: This article was translated from Arabic into English with the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI). The translation aims to preserve the meaning, tone, and analytical perspective of the original text.