From: xgl (xli03@emory.edu)
Date: Mon Mar 12 2001 - 13:07:41 MST
i know, it's repetitive -- but it's funny! don't you think?
-x
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2001 12:00:22 PST
From: AFP <C-afp@clari.net>
Subject: Cyprus gives thumbs-down to cloning science on island
NICOSIA, March 12 (AFP) - The Cypriot government said Monday it
was not about to permit anyone to start human cloning experiments on
the island after an Italian scientist targetted Cyprus as a possible
breeding ground.
Italian doctor Severino Antinori - who helped a 62-year-old
woman get pregnant in 1993 - said he would clone humans in Cyprus or
the former Soviet Union if the Israeli government thwarted his plans
to work there.
His aim to open a cloning laboratory in Israel was strongly
condemned by the Jewish state on Sunday following reports of the
doctor's ambitions in the German newsweekly Der Spiegel.
The obstetrician, who has boasted he could clone a human being
within two years, said in a statement Monday "there were countries
like Cyprus where (cloning) could be done."
This comment was met with a stern reaction by government
spokesman Michalis Papapetrou who told AFP: "We wouldn't allow such
a thing."
"We are against such things as the government has signed an
international treaty against cloning," he added.
While Cyprus has signed a Council of Europe protocol which bans
human cloning, the country does not yet have legislation in place
governing genetics.
So far, Antinori has not applied for a permit to work in Cyprus,
said
Papapetrou.
But last week, Cypriot-born Dr. Panayiotis Zavos -- a
reproduction specialist and a close associate of the Italian --
visited Nicosia from his home in the United States to tell the
government about his dream to open a cloning clinic for infertile
couples who wish to have babies.
Zavos met with Cyprus President Glafcos Clerides and Health
Minister Frixos Savvides last Tuesday and Wednesday and then went to
a conference in Rome where he met with Antinori.
Zavos' stop in Cyprus also coincided with a cabinet decision to
appoint two bioethics committees to draft legislation on the issue
of cloning.
"Relevant internal legislation will be forwarded to parliament
but this (cloning) would not be allowed to happen," an official
source told AFP.
The influential Cyprus Orthodox Church has condemned any
attempts to develop the island as the world's major cloning centre.
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