Uproar was caused by the sentence of the German Constitutional Court rejecting the suit of an unmarried couple that had requested a refund from the State for fertility treatment; married couples are given state aid for such treatment. The motivation of the Court is as follows: The legislator is permitted to consider marriage as the proper basis for life for a child and one in which the well-being of the child is considered more that it is in a relationship not based on marriage”. Monika Kappus writing in the Frankfurter Rundschau (01/03) comments as follows: “ The classic family has by now become just one of many models of life… the percentages of divorce and singles demonstrate that flexibility no longer dominates economic life alone. If married couples can offer more to children, this also depends on the fact that the legislator has failed to provide better guarantees for unmarried parents. A solution to the multiplicity of situations cannot be found with the old faith in the marriage that makes children happy”. An editorial in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung comments: “ The question has raised some curious social findings. Between 2003 and 2005 the number of artificially assisted births was almost halved because the social security funds do not reimburse the whole cost of such treatment. But what after all are these ‘lost’ sums in comparison with the joy of a child on the one hand, and the plurennial costs of maintaining a child on the other? The decision of some couples or the persuasive ability of some medics seem however to depend rather too much on the refund of the costs by a third party. If the legislator were to decide to open up refunds to the unmarried, it can be predicted that the exclusion of heterologous insemination would also lapse. At this point, the social security funds would be encouraged to reimburse the costs also of homosexual couples. This in turn would further invalidate the uniqueness previously recognized to marriage“. The Polish weekly TYGODNIK POWSZECHNY (9/2007) criticises the Minister for the Environment Jan Szyszko who, contrary to the guidelines of Brussels, has approved the plan for the construction round the little town of Augustow (north-east Poland) of a superhighway that would run through a valley unique from a landscape point of view and protected by the EU Nature 2000 programme. “The construction of the superhighway through the marshland of the valley of Rospuda discredits the Minister for the Environment and proves the indecision of the head of the government, who does not know how to extricate himself from the ecological impasse. Fortunately, there are determined and intelligent ecologists in the country” – writes the weekly with the hope that “the times when roads were planned blindfold” , without considering environmental constraints, the protection of the landscape or the wishes of the inhabitants, “ will finally end” . The sentence of the International Court of Justice in The Hague, according to which the massacre of Srebrenica was genocide but cannot be attributed to the Serbian State, even if the latter ought to have prevented it, is commented on by the French Catholic daily LA CROIX (27/02). Does this sentence, asks an editorial signed by Dominique Quinio, “also have a political explanation, that of making even more fragile Bosnia today, where, for good or for ill, the two entities, Serb and Croat-Muslim, live together?” “The decision of a court, however – the paper observes – is not enough in itself to dissipate hatred and build the future. It does not substitute the work that each people must itself perform: if it is guilty, to recognise its own responsibility; if it’s the victim, to foster reconciliation”. According to the British daily THE GUARDIAN (27/02), it’s the first time since the approval of the UN Convention against genocide (1948) “ that a whole State has been accused of genocide” . The sentence of the International Court “has set an important precedent: where a State is able to exert a positive influence or de facto authority to prevent a genocide, it is obliged to do so. The same principle ought to be applied on the responsibility of Sudan in the ethnic cleansing of Darfur“. “If the sentence of The Hague, however imperfect, clarifies the definition of genocide and the responsibility of States to prevent it – concludes the comment – it will have rendered an important service to the reinforcement of international law” . The US strategy in Iraq is becoming “more articulated”, observes Andrea Lavazza in an editorial in the Italian Catholic daily AVVENIRE (01/03) with reference to the conference to be held in Baghdad on 10 March; “ the representatives of Teheran and Syria and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council will also participate in it”. “It’s a delicate chess game” , says Lavazza . “Though the weapons of the terrorists will try to drown the voice of the conference, the promotion of talk by diplomacy is always to be welcomed, especially because the second American card in tackling the crisis could be to encourage the more active role of Europe as a mediator, hitherto a passive spectator as the situation unfolds. It’s not enough to blame the USA when it accelerates its war effort. Now that it is prepared to sit at the negotiating table, credible proposals are needed if she is to be listened to”.
