(本文选自《经济学人》20210320期)
背景介绍：
作为为数不多商业代孕完全合法的国家之一，俄罗斯议会国家杜马的一个议员小组近日制定了一项法律草案，该草案对俄罗斯女性代孕做出了严格的限制，明令禁止俄罗斯女性为外国人代孕生子。按照规定，俄罗斯只有满足妻子确实存在生育问题、具有俄联邦国籍、持有永久居住权、婚姻登记一年后、年龄在25~55岁之间这六项条件的夫妻才可以申请合法的代孕。
Russia’s liberal
surrogacy
rules are under threat
Conservatives fret that surrogate parents may be gay or foreign
Russia is one of the few places where commercial surrogacy is entirely legal (along with Ukraine, Georgia and some American states). Foreigners can pay a Russian woman for the use of her womb.
俄罗斯是为数不多商业代孕完全合法的国家之一（此外还有乌克兰、格鲁吉亚和美国的一些州）。外国人只需付钱便可使用俄罗斯女性的子宫。
Each year Russian surrogate mothers give birth to hundreds, perhaps thousands, of babies (estimates vary wildly). And in contrast to America, the service is cheap. Nine months of
gestation
plus labour can be bought for around $20,000.
每年，俄罗斯的代孕妈妈们会产下数百甚至上千个婴儿（实际数量可能会有很大偏差）。不同于美国的是，代孕在俄罗斯很便宜。怀孕9个月再加分娩只需花费大约2万美元。
But in the next few months or so, Russia’s parliament looks set to ban the practice, at least if the customers are foreign. “Russia is not an incubator,” says Irina Yarovaya, a deputy speaker of the Duma, Russia’s parliament.
但在接下来几个月，俄罗斯议会似乎要禁止这种做法，至少如果客户是外国人的话。俄罗斯议会国家杜马副议长伊琳娜·雅罗瓦亚说：“俄罗斯不是一个生育机器。”
The
apparent
trigger for this proposed change was the death of a baby boy who was born to a surrogate mother on behalf of a Filipino family last year. The baby was nursed in a rented flat outside Moscow and died while recovering from an operation on his brain.
引发这一提议的导火索显然是去年一名男婴的死亡，该男婴是代孕母亲为一个菲律宾家庭所生。这名婴儿在莫斯科郊外的一间出租公寓接受护理，他在接受脑部手术后的恢复期间死亡。
When the police entered the flat, they found three other babies being nursed for different Filipino families. These included three-month-old twins belonging to Fredenil Hernaez Castro, a member of the Philippines’ parliament.
当警察来到该公寓时，他们发现了另外三名受到照看的菲律宾客户的代孕婴儿。其中包括菲律宾国会议员弗雷德尼尔·赫奈斯·卡斯特罗的一对三个月大的双胞胎。
The police decided that they had
stumbled
upon a trafficking ring. Doctors who worked for the fertility clinics where the children had been born were arrested. So were a translator and a courier who had organised some of the documents.
警方认定这是他们偶然发现的一个拐卖婴儿的团伙。就职于孩子出生地生育诊所的医生随即被警方逮捕。同时被捕的还有一名翻译和一名整理运送文件的人员。
A lawyer who had made the arrangements was charged with child-trafficking but left the country before being arrested. The babies were sent to an
orphanage
, instead of their lawful Filipino parents.
一名作出这些安排的律师则被指控拐卖儿童，但他在被捕前就逃到了国外。这些婴儿被送到了孤儿院，而非他们合法的菲律宾父母那儿。
Many countries ban surrogacy because they fear that poor women will be exploited—that they are not capable of deciding for themselves whether the fee is worth the labour.
许多国家都禁止代孕，因为他们担心贫穷的妇女会受到剥削——无论费用是否值得，她们都无法自己做出决定。
Some activists liken surrogacy to prostitution (which they also think should be illegal). In Russia, by contrast, pro-government conservatives see the debate as an opportunity to bash gays.
一些活动人士将代孕比作卖淫（他们同样认为卖淫是非法的）。相比之下，亲政府的俄罗斯保守派将这场辩论视为一次抨击同性恋者的机会。
“If we do not engage in sexual education of our children, then the LGBT sex-instructors of NATO will do it for us,” said one talk-show guest recently. (NATO, a western alliance that Russia views with suspicion, has nothing to do with sex education in schools.)
最近，一位脱口秀嘉宾说道：“如果我们不对自己的孩子进行性教育，那么北约的LGBT性教育者会帮我们进行教育。”（俄罗斯对北约这个西方联盟持敌对态度，但该联盟与学校性教育毫无关系。）
Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, often vows to defend traditional family values. It is a
potent
rallying cry. Last year he held a referendum to change the constitution. The main aim was to allow himself to stay in power beyond 2024, but it was bundled with dozens of populist measures, including a constitutional ban on gay marriage.
俄罗斯总统普京经常发誓要捍卫传统的家庭价值观。这是一个强有力的口号。去年，他组织了一场全民公投，以对宪法进行修改。这场全民公投的主要目的是为了让他能在2024年之后继续执政，但他将这一目的与数十项民粹主义措施捆绑在一起，其中包括禁止同性婚姻的宪法禁令。
“As far as ‘parent number one’ and ‘parent number two’ go…as long as I’m president this will not happen. There will be dad and mum,” said Mr Putin. Voters had to say yes or no to the whole constitutional package. It passed easily.
普京说：“至于‘家长一号’和‘家长二号’……只要我还当一天总统，这种事情就不会发生，每个人都会有爸爸和妈妈。”选民们只能对整个修宪方案表示赞同或反对，因此修宪方案很容易就能通过。
(红色标注词为重难点词汇)
本文翻译：Vinnie
校核：Vinnie
编辑：Vinnie
随着代孕问题的暴露，越来越多的国家开始明文禁止商业代孕。柬埔寨、尼泊尔、泰国等众多国家都出台了相关的法律法规。近日，俄罗斯国家杜马的一个议员小组制定了一项法律草案，禁止向外国人提供代孕服务。代孕一事本就存在巨大争议，商业代孕更是法理难容。为了世界各国女性的健康，禁止商业代孕非常有必要。
surrogacy
[ˈsɜːrəɡəsi] n. 代孕
gestation
[dʒeˈsteɪʃn] n. 酝酿；怀孕；妊娠期
apparent
[əˈpærənt] adj. 显然的；表面上的
