German politicians and Protestant church officials Wednesday voiced displeasure at the Netherlands' decision to legalize euthanasia but an opinion poll showed they were out of step with public opinion.
A poll among 2,094 people by the Allensbach group and released Wednesday showed that 64 percent of west Germans and 80 percent of east Germans felt a critically ill patient had the right to ask a doctor to end his life.
Only 19 percent in the west and six percent in the east opposed mercy killings.
Justice Minister Herta Daeubler-Gmelin told state-run ARD television: "We should focus on letting humans die with dignity and without suffering and not waste our energy asking if euthanasia should be legalized."
She also told Berliner Zeitung newspaper: "We should ask ourselves whether patients can still have confidence in doctors. With euthanasia, a third person decides about a human's life. I think this is a mistake."
Hubert Hueppe, an opposition conservative who is on parliament's law and ethics committee for medicine, called the Dutch decision "despicable" and told ARD TV that it should not be copied in Europe.
Manfred Kock, head of the Council of the Protestant Church, said: "The commandment 'thou shalt not kill' and Christian beliefs that human life belongs to God contradict euthanasia."
The Dutch Senate approved legislation Tuesday legalizing euthanasia under certain conditions, and making the Netherlands the first country in the world to allow mercy killings.
A spokesman for the Dutch justice ministry said the law would come into force within three or four months – BERLIN (AFP)
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