Criminal bill gives green light to euthanasia in Venezuela

[ChangoLoa]

In Venezuela, a person with terminal cancer may request his doctor to help him die and the physician will be able to meet his request, without any legal liability.

This could be so, provided that the draft Organic Criminal Code prepared by the National Assembly's Committee on Interior Policy is passed. The bill legalizes euthanasia in Venezuela.

This is not the first time in the last few years that the Venezuela's National Assembly makes this type of proposal. In 2004, the draft Criminal Code that the Supreme Tribunal of Justice (TSJ) submitted to the National Assembly made a similar proposal, although in some cases, it provided for specific penalties.

Alberto Arteaga Sánchez, a former dean of the Faculty of Political and Juridical Sciences, Central University of Venezuela, questioned the constitutionality of the proposal made in the bill prepared by the Committee on Interior Policy, Venezuelan National Assembly.


http://english.eluniversal.com/2010/10/11/en_pol_art_criminal-bill-gives_11A4591773.shtml

[Downwinder]

1. I would welcome that.

[Judi Lynn]

4. So would so many, many, many others in the U.S..

What is criminal is throwing a doctor like Kevorkian in prison who has humanely assisted people who desperately wish to put an end to overwhelming, dehumanizing, increasingly unbearable pain.

[ChangoLoa]

6. Of course.

[rabs]

2. A "criminal bill"

Don't see anything or anyone in the El Universal text that backs up that the proposed legislation is a "criminal bill."

[Downwinder]

3. More like a Humanitarian Bill.

[ChangoLoa]

5. No, it's official terminology

They're not saying the bill is criminal. It's called a criminal bill in Ven legislation. Like this one:

Criminal bill partly legalizes abortion in Venezuela
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=405x42946

[Downwinder]

7. Basically, they are decriminalizing euthanasia in cases of cancer?

[ChangoLoa]

8. Right. It's probably an example because many other cases should be included. nt

[rabs]

9. Out of curiosity

what is the term in Spanish -- "legislacion criminal?"

this is the second term I have seen in recent days that caught my attention.

Correa before the coup attempt was talking of invoking a "muerte cruzada" (crossed death) act. I emailed a reporter in Quito and she replied that it meant Correa could close the national assembly and rule by decree if legislation became hopelessly stalemated in Congress.

[ChangoLoa]

10. "Penal"

Codigo Penal = Criminal Code