Germany has made a further step towards legalising assisted suicide after the country’s doctors’ association deleted from its code of conduct a ban on the practice.

Last year Germany’s highest court ruled unconstitutional a law that prohibited assisted suicide. Since then two separate draft Bills to legalise it are working their way through parliament. A final vote is expected before the end of next month.

The issue is particularly sensitive in Germany, given the Nazi regime murdered at least 300,000 people with mental and physical disabilities it dubbed “unworthy of life”.

German doctors held an emotional debate on the issue at their annual gathering on Wednesday. One camp urged the association to regulate the existing reality of assisted suicide in Germany, while another camp warned of “opening Pandora’s box”.

In a subsequent vote, a majority voted in favour of removing from their charter the sentence: “A doctor may not provide any assistance for suicide.”

The federation said it accepted its members’ “individual questions of conscience and no longer want to pursue this as breach of professional obligations”.