The Head of the Ministry of Women and Gender Justice, Antonia Orellana, together with President Gabriel Boric.MinMujeryEG (RR SS)
Chilean Minister for Women and Equality Antonia Orellana, who is very close to President Gabriel Boric, has joined the criticism of surrogate mothers in the case of Spanish presenter Ana Obregón, who at the age of 68 welcomed the practice in Florida. United States where it is legal unlike Spain. Through a thread posted on his Twitter account in which he directly alluded to Obregón by covering the cover of ¡Hola! revealed the story, the Chilean minister rejected surrogacy. “We don’t lend the body,” he said, before adding, “It’s important to eliminate violence in all its forms, including those that are opening up today.”
Orellana is a member of the same party as President Boric, Social Convergence, which is part of the Broad Front (FA), a group in great harmony with Podemos. Thus, at the end of January, the President’s partner, Irina Karamanos, took part in the International Feminist Meeting organized by the Spanish Ministry of Gender Equality, headed by Minister Irene Montero. When Boric took office as president in March 2022, the Spanish minister was part of the Spanish government delegation that arrived in Chile to welcome the new president. When Montero was attacked by Vox in Congress last November, Boric expressed his solidarity: “From Latin America, my full support for Irene Montero. Tireless partner in the fight for more justice and equality, facing today a new uproar of political violence from the extreme right. You are not alone Irene. A Transoceanic Embrace”.
The comments of the Chilean Minister for Women come exactly one day after Minister Montero drew attention to the Obregón case and described renting a car as a “form of violence against women”.
In her messages via Twitter, the 33-year-old Chilean minister recalled her presentation at the 67th edition of the Commission on the Legal and Social Situation of Women (CSW67) on March 9 and 10 in New York, where surrogacy was discussed for purposes was addressed. “About the controversy surrounding this case of a woman going to the US (because it’s illegal in Spain) to buy a bus [bebé]in March we traveled to the #CSW67 to warn of the dangers of surrogacy for commercial gain,” Orellana wrote. “Deregulation enables the sexual exploitation of women, human trafficking and the sale of children. The theme of #CSW67 was technology and my position was clear: “We don’t lend our bodies” and it’s important to root out violence in all its forms, including those that are opening up today,” he added.
In addition, Orellana said that “given our country’s painful history of violence against rural women, the impoverished or victims of violence who have been lured into child trafficking, we cannot help but warn the Global South of the danger of these practices.”
Regarding the controversy surrounding this case of a woman going to the US (because it’s illegal in Spain) to buy a bus, we traveled to the US in March #CSW67 to warn about the dangers of surrogacy for commercial purposes ✋🏻 pic.twitter.com/rtTGF8q0Fs
— Antonia Orellana (she/they) (@totiorellanag) March 30, 2023
There is no regulation in Chile
Camila Maturana, director of Humanas, a center specializing in human rights and gender equality, points out that there is no regulation on surrogacy in Chile and that there is a debate in Chilean society about it.
“According to international experience, there are countries that prohibit this practice and even prosecute it. Others regulate it for altruistic purposes, with no payment or profit, while there are countries that allow it. In these cases, a market has emerged that favors people from different countries who, with the money they need, can fulfill their desire for motherhood or fatherhood. However, the main concern in this regard is the protection of women in vulnerable situations that could expose them to situations of exploitation,” explains the lawyer.
Maturana adds that if there is any discussion about this, what needs to be clarified is whether the legislation is capable of protecting the best interests of children and young people, “and given the preservation of the decision-making autonomy of all women, especially poor women is the unfortunate history of our country”. “Both during the civil-military dictatorship (1973-1990) and afterwards, there were numerous cases of illegal adoptions, which were in fact cases of child trafficking theft,” says the Humanas expert.
Minister Orellana has a recognized career in feminism. Boric’s government, in turn, was the first in Chile to openly declare itself a feminist and has a joint cabinet of 12 women and 12 men, among other symbols. The President’s wife, Karamanos, initially assumed the position of First Lady, but later transformed this space and stopped working at La Moneda. However, government spokeswoman Camila Vallejo assured in mid-March: “It is very presumptuous on our part to say that we are a feminist government (…) It is a claim.”