Germany sets up ethics panel

BERLIN, Germany -- The German government has set up an ethics panel to grapple with tricky scientific issues such as genetic research.

The Cabinet approved a 24-member National Ethics Council in which leading scientists are to join church, business and labour leaders.

The body will address "areas of tension between great medical hopes, economic expectations and people's understandable fears of reproduction and selection."

Philosophers, ecologists, and social and legal experts will take up other places on the panel.

Government spokesman Uwe-Karsten Heye said it should help political leaders tackle questions which they "may only answer in the greatest possible agreement with society."

The government stressed the council's independence, pointing to its broad composition and that it must decide on its own leaders and agenda, which remains vague.

German scientists have played a prominent role in genetic research, but genetic engineering remains an emotive subject.

Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder last year condemned British moves to allow more research on embryos, creating the possibility of human cloning.

But he also urged Germany to throw off its "ideological blinders" and consider amending its own laws on embryo research to avoid falling behind in the development of new treatments.

The government argues that the new council will help legislators and ordinary Germans alike to make sense of such complex issues and give Germany a stronger voice in international debates.

But opposition politicians complained that the council may overshadow parliament's own year-old commission working on ethical questions and duplicate work in a similar body attached to the Health Ministry.

The council is intended to "jump ahead of the elected parliamentarians and their commission," said Christian Democrat Hubert Hueppe, deputy chairman of parliament's ethics committee.

Ilja Seifert, a member of the ex-communist Party of Democratic Socialism and of parliament's ethics commission, said the move seemed intended to give the government policy "an 'ethical' coat of paint so that Germany doesn't fall behind in the globalisation race."

The council has yet to announce when it will hold its first meeting, and no date has been set for it to make its first recommendations.

Britain to ban human cloning
April 19, 2001
House members open hearings on human cloning
March 28, 2001
Italy doctor defends human cloning
March 22, 2001
Cardinal blasts cloning plans
March 10, 2001

Human Genetics Advisory Commission
Human Cloning Foundation
German Parliament

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