Circumcision row hits Austria as doctors advise against it even on religious grounds
A row over circumcision has spread to Austria from
Germany after a state governor advised doctors against performing the
procedure, even when it is on religious grounds.
Markus Wallner, centre-right state premier of Vorarlberg,
said the instructions followed a controversial June ruling by a court in the
German city of Cologne that equated circumcision of young boys with grievous
bodily harm.
That verdict provoked uproar from religious and political
leaders in Israel as well as Muslim countries, with Chancellor Angela Merkel
reportedly saying it risked making Germany a "laughing stock".
Wallner's move meanwhile was slammed as an "attack
on religious freedom" by Fuat Sanac, head of the Islamic Community of
Austria (IGGiOe), according to comments due to be published in Wednesday's Der
Standard daily.
The move "is not worthy of Austria", Sanac
said, calling circumcision "a tradition going back thousands of
years". Oskar Deutsch, the head of Vienna's Jewish Community, said that
the practice was "protected by the constitution".
A spokesman for the centre-left Social Democrats - in a
coalition at national level with Wallner's Austrian People's Party - accused
the state premier of "giving in to populism".
In Graz, the capital of the southeastern state of Styria,
the children's hospital has decided not to carry out any more circumcisions
that have not already been scheduled.
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