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[12 January 2010] - Activists in Azerbaijan say women pregnant with girls are being forced to undergo abortions or even being abandoned by their husbands because their families are determined to have male children. The situation has become so serious that parliament is discussing banning abortions after the sex of the child is known to prevent the gender proportions in the population becoming dangerously unbalanced. “They sent me together with my two daughters to my father’s house. We are still not officially divorced, but my husband and his relatives have not asked after us for a year already. I can understand why he doesn’t want me, but why are our children to blame that they are girls?” she asked. And when she went into labour, her husband refused to take her to hospital. Three days after the death of her child, she was thrown out of the house, in a case of domestic abuse that activists say is depressingly common in the country. “And cases when husbands, the husbands’ parents or other relatives force the women to have an abortion and get rid of the girl are fairly common.” “Azeris love boys more than girls, it’s in our mentality. My husband forced me to go for an abortion six times before I gave birth to a son. Every time when I was pregnant when the time came to find out the sex of the child, I was so scared. Every time I had to go through this hell and I could not explain to my husband what torture it is to have an abortion, especially so many times,” she said. Currently, the population as a whole shows almost equal numbers but if the abortion of female foetuses continues then the country could become unbalanced. According to the statistics committee, 25,000 abortions were conducted in 2008, up from 22,000 the year before. More than 60 per cent of them took place in the third month of pregnancy, which is when the sex of the child can be easily discovered by ultrasound scans. That, experts say, is likely to mean the majority of the aborted foetuses were female. The potential demographic effect of the trend has spurred officials to take action, and a group of parliamentary deputies has drawn up a bill on reproductive health and family planning. Further information