In their book Half the Sky, Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn warn: "More girls have been killed in the last fifty years, precisely because they are girls, than men were killed in all the wars of the twentieth century combined. More girls are killed in this routine 'gendercide' in any one decade than people were slaughtered in all the genocides of the twentieth century."
There are an estimated 160 million 'missing' girls in the world today with a baby girl aborted in India at a rate of one per minute. China and India have dangerously skewed sex ratios in the youngest age groups, but the problem is evident around the world and twenty-eight countries currently have significant gender imbalances. In recent years, both the Telegraph and the Independent have run investigations showing sex-selective abortion taking place in Britain. Despite government claims to the contrary, there is strong evidence that sex selective abortion is being practised among some communities within the UK, as well as in other industrialised countries.
However, pro-abortion groups either ignore the problem or insist upon defending sex selective abortion even when women are being coerced into them by patriarchal forces. Supporting the extermination of baby girls and the abuse of their mothers in the name of gender equality is hypocritical in the extreme.
Recent efforts to change the law
On 24th February 2015, MPs voted to reject an amendment put forward by Fiona Bruce MP to clarify the law regarding sex-selective abortion. The Conservative MP said that her amendment would "clarify beyond doubt in statute that sex selective abortion is illegal in UK law". Even though this was no more than a modest attempt to clarify that the law is as the government says it is, the amendment was defeated by 292 votes to 201.
It is truly worrying that those who insist that abortion must be available on demand - claiming that it is a woman's 'right' - are so opposed to any attempt to stop the killing of baby girls who are being aborted purely because they are girls.