Germany’s parliament voted on Friday to criminalize commercial euthanasia after rejecting draft laws that would have made assisted suicide fully legal in the country.
The new law criminalizes organizations that assist patients seeking to terminate their lives in return for payment and makes assisting a suicide punishable by up to three years in prison. But critics said the law, the first detailed legislation on assisted suicide ever passed by the German parliament, did not make clear whether assisted suicide was now a criminal offence in all cases.