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Burma's pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi was freed today after 19 months of house arrest, in what she called "a new dawn" for the military-ruled country.
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Nation and World
Mercy Killing Now Legal in Netherlands
Euthanasia becomes legal in the Netherlands today, making the country the first in the world to formally sanction mercy killing.
Although the authorities have turned a blind eye to the practice for two decades, doctors still risked prosecution from disgruntled relatives and had to decide...
By Guardian Newspapers, 4/1/2002
Euthanasia becomes legal in the Netherlands today, making the country the first in the world to formally sanction mercy killing.
Although the authorities have turned a blind eye to the practice for two decades, doctors still risked prosecution from disgruntled relatives and had to decide themselves who was a "deserving case".
Doctors often found themselves hauled before the courts even in cases where they had obtained the consent of the dying patient.
Under the new law, euthanasia will be administered only to patients who are in a state of continuous, unbearable and incurable suffering. A second opinion will be required, the patient must be judged to be of sound mind, and their request to die must be made voluntarily, independently and persistently.
The Dutch upper house of parliament voted last April to approve the legislation, ending 30 years of debate on the subject. There are already between 2,000 and 3,000 recorded cases of euthanasia in the Netherlands each year.
The move is not without controversy, despite the fact that more than 90% of the Dutch population supports it.
Christian groups have argued that it is immoral while the UN Human Rights Committee of independent experts has said it has serious concerns about the new legislation. It has warned that mercy killing in the Netherlands risks becoming routine and insensitive, and has questioned the rationale behind letting children as young as 12 opt for euthanasia with parental backing.
It has also objected to the fact that checks on whether the legal requirements were met will be carried out only after a patient's death.
Other critics have claimed that the Dutch initiative will trigger a wave of "euthanasia tourism". However, a clause insisting on a well-established relationship between doctor and patient is designed to quash this.
"People from abroad have always thought it was easy to do it [euthanasia] in the Netherlands, but in fact it's not," Walburg de Jong, a spokeswoman for the Dutch Voluntary Euthanasia Society said.
Although the law only takes effect today it has helped keep one doctor out of jail already. The physician was convicted last December of "illegally" assisting a Dutch politician to take his own life in 1998 but was spared a custodial sentence after a court, taking the new law into account, ruled he had acted compassionately.
Legalisation of euthanasia in the Netherlands has already prompted neighbouring Belgium to draw up its own law on mercy killing which is awaiting approval from the country's chamber of deputies.
Other countries are now likely to follow suit.
The French health minister, Bernard Kouchner, who is himself a doctor, has already said that he will use the Dutch experience to press for change in France. A fierce debate is raging in Australia on the subject.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2001
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