Uruguayan senators vote to ease abortion laws

MONTEVIDEO - Uruguayan senators voted on Tuesday to ease the country's tough abortion laws, although the president has vowed to veto any legislation that seeks to decriminalize the procedure.

Abortion is tightly restricted in mainly Roman Catholic Latin American. In Uruguay, women are only allowed to have an abortion if they were raped or if the pregnancy endangers their lives.

Tuesday's vote gives preliminary approval to a bill that would let women have an abortion in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy on grounds including economic or social hardship or "circumstances linked to how the conception took place."

The bill's chances of becoming law appear limited.

Even though it was presented by ruling party lawmakers, President Tabare Vazquez -- a doctor -- has said he would use his veto power to block it.

Under Uruguay's 1938 abortion law, women who have the procedure face up to nine months in prison while abortion practitioners face up to two years.

Those in favor of easing the law say 30,000 illegal abortions are performed in the country of 3.3 million people every year.

Latin America is home to about half the world's Catholics and abortion is only fully legal in Cuba and Guyana.