Council of Europe Bans Euthanasia

Yesterday, on January 25, 2012, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) adopted a  Resolution stating that “euthanasia must always be prohibited.” This articulates a strong principle for life and against euthanasia, given that, for the first time, euthanasia has been so clearly rejected by a European political institution. 
 
This is a third major victory for life and dignity of the weakest, after the 2010 resolution that strengthened freedom of conscience for doctors and medical staff and after the European Court of Human Rights asserted last year that there is no right to euthanasia or assisted suicide under the European Convention.

The resolution passed yesterday states in §5: “Euthanasia, in the sense of the intentional killing by act or omission of a dependent human being for his or her alleged benefit, must always be prohibited.”

EU needs to stop funding unethical research on embryos

Despite the European Court of Justice maintaining the non-patentability of human embryos in a recent decision (Greenpeace vs Brustle, C 34/10), the European Commission continues funding embryonic stem cell research.

Under the name “Horizon 2020”, the European Commission (EC) recently presented to the European Parliament (EP) its next Framework Program for Research and Innovation, which provides €80 billion in funding from 2014 to 2020 for scientific research - including embryonic stem cell research.