Poles join strike as protests against abortion ruling expand
A women's rights activist with a poster of the Women's Strike action protests in Warsaw, Poland, Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2020 against recent tightening of Poland's restrictive abortion law. Tens of thousands of people, gathering in defiance of pandemic restrictions, vented their frustration about the abortion ruling and more broadly at perceived restrictions on their freedoms under the right-wing ruling party, Law and Justice. Protests against last week's court ruling also spread to other countries. Rage over the ruling, which would deny legal abortions to women even in cases of fatal birth defects, has been directed at the Roman Catholic Church and ruling party leader Kaczynski. “I am very troubled by this situation,” Duda, who is allied with the ruling party, told Polsat News.