If this legislative process is successful, Portugal will become the fourth European country to legalize euthanasia.
Shortly before the election, hundreds of opponents of the project demonstrated in front of the Assembly with cries of “Yes to life, no to death”. The Portuguese Parliament adopted Thursday, February 20, several texts paving the way for the decriminalization of euthanasia. Five draft laws, including one tabled by the Socialist Party (in power), were approved at first reading by deputies from the left and from the center of the political spectrum.
The text submitted by the PS, which determines “the special conditions for the practice of non-punishable euthanasia”, was approved with 127 votes for, 86 votes against and ten abstentions. Similar proposals from the Left Bloc (far left), the PAN animal party, the Greens and a Liberal MP were also adopted, with barely tighter results.
President may veto
The proposals adopted on Thursday must now be merged into a single text which will then be submitted to a final vote of the Parliament, in principle before the summer. This law will then be subject to the promulgation of the President of the Republic, the curator Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa.
The head of state did not openly take a position on this subject but, as a devout Catholic, he could oppose a veto, which would however be canceled by a second vote of deputies, or send the text to the Constitutional Court for that it judges its conformity with the fundamental law of the country.
If this legislative process is successful, Portugal will become the fourth European country to legalize euthanasia after the Netherlands and Belgium in 2002, then Luxembourg in 2009.
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