One of Europe's leading clinical psychologists has said the practice of assisted suicide should be introduced in Ireland.
Amsterdam-based Professor Ad Kerkhof told a conference in Armagh this afternoon that assisted suicide, which is permitted in the Netherlands, offered terminally ill patients the least bad option where medication and therapy had failed to bring relief.
Assisted suicide is illegal in Ireland but a number of Irish people have gone abroad to countries where the practice is permitted.
Professor Kerkhof was speaking at the annual conference of the Irish Association of Suicidology.
The association's President Fine Gael TD Dan Neville said he would strongly oppose any move to allow assisted suicide in Ireland.
He said introducing it would be a backward step and the start of a slippery slope to deciding in what exact circumstances the practice could be permitted.
Mr Neville said a way of tackling the growing number of suicides here would be for the Government to finance better resources for psychiatric health services.
