Europe 1 with AFP 7:45 a.m., March 9, 2024

In La Roche-sur-Yon, a statue of Simone Veil was vandalized, soiled with red paint and covered with a slogan hostile to voluntary termination of pregnancy (abortion).

The town hall filed a complaint.

The town hall of La Roche-sur-Yon (Vendée) announced on Friday that it had filed a complaint after acts of vandalism committed on a statue of Simone Veil, soiled with red paint and covered with a slogan hostile to voluntary termination of pregnancy (IVG).

A poster “the Constitution is killing our children” plastered

This statue of Simone Veil, who in January 1975 had the law decriminalizing abortion in France adopted, had been surrounded by baby dolls sprayed with fake blood and the water of the fountain it overlooks also dyed red, was the town hall told AFP, confirming information from local media.

According to

Ouest-France

, a poster "the Constitution is killing our children" had also been posted under Ms. Veil's bust.

The town hall of La Roche-sur-Yon stressed that it immediately had this damage cleaned up by municipal agents and said it had filed a complaint with the public prosecutor in the morning.

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Already vandalized in 2019

These degradations hostile to abortion occurred on the same day of the ceremony of affixing the seal of the Republic to the law including the "guaranteed freedom" of access to abortion in the Constitution, organized in Paris under the aegis of Emmanuel Macron. 

The statue of Simone Veil had already been vandalized with paint in 2019, less than a week after the inauguration of the square bearing her name.