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A6 WORLD NEWS
Thursday 17 OcTOber 2024
New UK bill aims to legalize assisted dying for people who are

terminally ill

By MARIA CHENG of Parliament, saying “all
AP Medical Writer we are asking for is the right
LONDON (AP) — A new to choose.” Rantzen said in
bill aiming to legalize as- the absence of a legal way
sisted dying in Britain was to end her life in Britain, she
introduced in Parliament plans to travel to Switzer-
on Wednesday, mark- land, where assisted sui-
ing the first time in nearly cide is legal for foreigners.
a decade that the House Opponents of assisted dy-
of Commons will debate ing, however, say there is
allowing doctors to help no way to change the law
end people’s lives after without endangering vul-
previous court challenges nerable people, according
to change a legal blanket to actress Liz Carr, a disabil-
ban failed. ity rights campaigner.
Labour politician Kim Lead- Assisted suicide where pa-
beater read out the name tients take a lethal drink
of the bill in the House of prescribed by a doctor is
Commons, formally start- legal in Australia, Belgium,
ing it on its journey through Canada, Luxembourg, the
Parliament. The bill grants Netherlands, New Zealand,
terminally ill people in Eng- Portugal, Spain, Switzerland
land and Wales a way to and parts of the U.S., with
allow physicians to help A small demonstration by people advocating assisted dying hold a protest outside the Hoses of regulations on qualifying
them die, although the de- Parliament as a bill to legalise assisted dying is to be put before lawmakers in London, England, criteria varying by jurisdic-
Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2024.
tails won’t be released until Associated Press tion.
later in the month, ahead Naomi Richards, an anthro-
of its first substantial debate ple or those with mental ill- morning. Leadbeater’s bill House of Lords restricts as- pologist at the University of
and a Parliamentary vote. ness who are not terminally is likely to be similar to one sisted dying to adults with six Glasgow who specializes
Prime Minister Keir Starmer ill being pressured to end introduced in the House or fewer months to live and in death and dying, said
has promised that lawmak- their lives,” Leadbeater said of Lords earlier this year requires permission from the number of people who
ers will have a “free vote,” in a statement. She said it is that has made only slow the High Court after hav- might make use of assisted
meaning they will not be “important that we get the progress. The unelected ing a declaration signed dying, if legalized in Britain,
obliged to vote along party legislation right, with the House of Lords studies and by two doctors, among would be fairly limited, un-
lines. Starmer supported a necessary protections and amends legislation passed other criteria.Esther Rant- less the public pushed for
2015 assisted dying bill and safeguards in place.” by the elected House of zen, the founder of a British wider access.”These are
has said “there are grounds Small groups of protest- Commons. While bills can children’s charity who has questions that in a democ-
for changing the law.” ers both for and against originate in the Lords, they advanced lung cancer, racy will only be answered
“There is absolutely no the bill gathered outside rarely become law. encouraged people to further down the road,” she
question of disabled peo- Parliament on Wednesday The bill introduced in the write to their local member said.q

Zimbabwe to compensate white farmers who lost land in seizures

20 years ago

By FARAI MUTSAKA ern African nation gained government approved 441 lion, will be paid in cash to cluded beatings and rape,
Associated Press independence from white applications for compen- local farmers who lost land. according to Human Rights
HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) — minority rule in 1980. sation worth $351.6 million The balance, Ncube said, Watch. The seizures badly
Zimbabwe says it will com- Finance Minister Mthu- from local white farmers will be paid through the is- impacted commercial
pensate local and foreign li Ncube announced and 94 applications from suance of treasury bonds. farming, forcing a coun-
white farmers who lost land Wednesday at a meet- foreigners worth $196.6 mil- Foreigners will receive try that was a key regional
and property more than 20 ing with diplomats that his lion, but only 1%, or $3.5 mil- an initial $20 million to be food producer and export-
years ago in farm seizures shared equally among the er to rely on assistance from
meant to redress some of 94 claimants from Den- donors.
the wrongs of colonialism. mark, Germany, Nether- Zimbabwe’s agriculture
About 4,000 white farm- lands, Switzerland and sev- sector has rebounded in
ers lost their homes and eral countries in eastern Eu- recent years, but recent
swathes of land when the rope, he said. droughts are now the main
Black-majority country’s White farmers who owned challenge. The compensa-
then-president, Robert the majority of prime farm- tion for the local farmers
Mugabe, launched the land were removed from is not for the land which
often-chaotic redistribu- their farms, often forcibly Mugabe’s government
tion program in 2000, which by violent mobs led by vet- said had been seized from
turned violent at times. erans of the country’s 1970s Zimbabwe’s Black majority
Mugabe, who died in 2019, Zimbabwe farm squatters burn a field of standing crops at independence war. Some under colonialism but for
said it was aimed at ad- Chirobi Farm, about 43 miles (70 kms) north of Harare, Saturday farmers and their workers infrastructure such as build-
dressing colonial-era land Nov. 11, 2000. died or were seriously in- ings, wells and irrigation
inequities after the south- Associated Press jured in the violence that in- equipment. q