ITALY: Bitterness and division have arisen in Italy in the debate over assisted fertility treatment, the subject of a referendum this weekend, writes Paddy Agnew
This weekend, Italians will vote in a referendum on assisted fertility treatment that has prompted social divisions and bitterness of a sort not seen since the divorce and abortion referendums of the 1970s and early 1980s.
The issue is one that has set church against state, believer against non-believer, husband against wife, party leader against party faithful, left against right and scientist against scientist.
At stake are complex questions over fertility treatment which many would argue are incompatible with a referendum context that is better suited to a mere Yes or No vote.
At stake, too, is the moral authority of the Catholic Church, which first lobbied hard for the restrictive legislation on fertility treatment introduced last year and which now, in the person of Pope Benedict XVI, has fought hard to defend that legislation from those who wish to partially repeal it via this referendum.
Opponents of the current legislation argue that it is just about the most restrictive of its kind in the Western world.
De facto, last year's law bans all embryo (stem cell) research, while it also bans sperm and egg donation, thus effectively denying gay couples and single women access to in-vitro fertilisation techniques.
Furthermore, it limits in-vitro treatment to sterile couples, requiring that only three embryos be created during treatment and that all three embryos are then simultaneously implanted.
In addition, the law does not allow for recourse to preventive diagnosis on the genetic health of the about-to-be-implanted embryos. In other words, the legislation obliges couples to implant embryos which may or may not be diseased.
Finally, and arguably most controversially, the current law "protects the rights of all parties involved" in the fertility treatment process, "including the conceived one". In other words, the embryo is considered to have the same rights as a mother.
This weekend, voters will be confronted with four different ballot papers asking if they wish to repeal the law in relation to the above issues. A Yes vote for any or all of the four questions would oblige parliament to change the relative clauses in the law. A No vote would obviously ensure that the law as it stands would remain on the statute book.
Supporters of the current legislation argue that while it is certainly not perfect, it is still a vast improvement on the legal vacuum that prevailed before its introduction in February 2004.
The fruit of a nearly 10-year gestation, through two successive legislatures, the law was meant to curtail the so-called "far west" situation in which "creative" fertility specialists pulled off questionable therapies such as those which used donor eggs and sperms to ensure pregnancies for post-menopausal women, often in their late 50s or early 60s.
Opponents of the legislation see it as a "bridgehead" with the next stopping point being Italy's abortion legislation. Those in favour of repealing the law argue that by protecting the "rights" of the embryo, the fertility treatment legislation gravely contradicts the abortion law, which allows for an abortion in cases where the physical or mental health of the woman is at serious risk.
The new law, say its detractors, has created a juridical anomaly in which an Italian embryo has more legal rights than an Italian foetus.
That anomaly leads many on the Yes side to suspect that the No side, if it wins Sunday's vote, will then focus on law 194 on abortion. Those fears were hardly assuaged by two recent controversial statements from Pope Benedict.
Speaking to the Italian Bishops' Conference last week, the Pope praised the efforts of the Italian bishops in trying "to illuminate the choice of Catholics and of all citizens in the imminent referendum on assisted procreation".
The Pope was referring to the tough campaign waged by the bishops (and, in particular, by one of his key "electors" in the recent conclave, namely Cardinal Camillo Ruini) urging Italians not to vote at all, in the hope that the electoral turnout fails to reach the required 50 per cent quorum, thus seeing it declared null and void.
Having waded into the referendum campaign with that statement, the Pope then underlined his message with another tough statement this week in which he not only denounced the "pseudo-freedoms" of same-sex marriages but went on to condemn "terminating or manipulating life".
Many Italian Catholics would seem to be ready to follow the church's line. For a start, Francesco Rutelli, a former Radical Party exponent and now president of the centre-left Margherita Party, stunned political allies and opponents alike in declaring that he will abstain this weekend.
Next day, mind you, we discovered that Mr Rutelli is no prophet in his own salotto since his wife, journalist Barbara Palombelli, told readers of La Repubblica that she would be voting four times Yes.
Similar consternation was caused on the other side of the political fence when foreign minister Gianfranco Fini, leader of former Fascist Alleanza Nazionale, said that he would be voting and, furthermore, would be voting three times Yes out of four.
(He will vote No to the clause banning egg and sperm donation.)
That statement has put Mr Fini's very leadership of the party in jeopardy.
Given that the government had worked hard to steer the current law through parliament, Mr Fini's declaration of voting intent was seen by some as illogical.
Yet the foreign minister is not the only centre-right cabinet member to cross the line, since his colleague Stefania Prestigiacomo, Minister for Equal Opportunities, has also strongly condemned the current legislation and will be voting four times Yes.
Even prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, according to himself, has been faced with domestic strife over the referendum.
Although the prime minister has not said how or indeed even if he will vote, he has acknowledged that his wife, Veronica Lario, will be voting Yes.
For the Yes side, this weekend's referendum represents an attempt to block a Council of Trent-style revivalist crusade by right-wing Catholic forces.
Nobel Prize-winning scientist Rita Levi Montalcino claims that Italian scientific research risks a regression to "mediaeval times" if the current law is not changed. For many women, too, the current legislation is an attempt to turn the clock backwards, denying them control over their own bodies.
For the No side, the referendum represents a chance to defend the right to life. The No side has coined a clever motto, "Benedetto chi si astiene" (Blessed is he who abstains).
Benedetto, meaning blessed, is also the Italian for Benedict.
When the votes are counted next Monday evening, will the Benedict effect have swayed the voters?