Spanish pregnant Defence Minister heads for Afghanistan

Spanish pregnant Defence Minister heads for Afghanistan
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By h.b. - Apr 19, 2008 - 8:59 AM

Spanish Minister for Defence, Carme Chacón, with General Félix Sanz Roldán - Photo EFE

Carme Chacón has been in the post for just five days and is in Afghanistan today to visit the Spanish troops.

Five days after taking up her position as Spain’s first female Minister of Defence, and despite being seven months pregnant, Carme Chacón has travelled the more than 6,000 kms to Afghanistan to visit the Spanish troops.

With her on the trip are the Secretary of State for International Cooperation, Leire Pajín, and Chief of the Defence Staff, Félix Suárez.
The Spanish media have been surprised by the trip, which they describe as a demonstration of the will and commitment to the post.

She left the Torrejón de Ardoz airbase near Madrid on Friday night at 9,30pm and after a stop over in Kuwait will today visit the troops at the Spanish base of Herat in Afghanistan. She is expected to spend the entire day there and sleep on the return plane. Chacón will see for herself the problems at the base on a mission which has not advanced significantly over recent years, where the brief for the Spanish troops is for reconstruction and humanitarian aid. The Spanish Government recently refused a NATO request to send more troops to the zone.

Reports indicate that the Minister also intends to visit the Spanish bases in Kosovo and Lebanon in the immediate future, before the birth of her child.
Doctors usually advice pregnant women not to fly after the seventh month of pregnancy, although there is no set rule. Some airlines, such as American Airlines will allow flying as late as eight days before birth, if the mother signs a no-claims statement. It’s understood that a gynaecologist is travelling with the Minister just in case.

The appointment of Chacón, and the other female ministers in the Zapatero cabinet has attracted some harsh and in some cases personal comments against them in the right wing media. Responding to the bad press Ángela Sanroma from the Castilla-La Mancha Women’s Institute has said that the critics are in fact the seeds from which ill-treatment and domestic violence can grow. She said they hide a machismo ‘which a democratic society cannot allow’.

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