A new draft bill in Germany would introduce fines of up to €5,000 for peaceful expression on public streets near facilities that offer abortion.

The bill, announced last week by Germany’s Federal Family Minister Lisa Paus, who belongs to the Green party, would seek to create nationwide exclusion zones around the facilities, criminalising messages that could be subjectively understood as “disturbing” or “confusing,” with no legal clarity as to how those terms are to be interpreted.

Harassment is already fully illegal, independent of the proposed new law, which would target peaceful expression.

The proposed new law would, if enacted, be in direct contravention to a 2023 decision from the country’s top administrative court upholding the freedom of assembly across the street from an abortion facility. The ruling affirmed the rights of a pro-life activist who conducted silent prayer vigils on the public street in Pforzheim, Germany. Such an exercise of basic human rights would likely run afoul of the proposed new legislation.

Catholic leaders in central India are calling for increased security ahead of the installation of a new bishop.

The call comes in the wake of anti-Christian assaults by Hindu activists, which featured the placement of saffron flags on the rooftops of four Protestant churches,

The incidents occurred last week following Sunday services in the four churches in the Jhabua district of the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. According to local media reports, the Hindu militants were celebrating the Jan. 22 consecration of a new temple to the Lord Ram in neighboring Uttar Pradesh state on a site believed to be the Hindu deity’s birthplace.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who attended the consecration ceremony, has touted the massive new temple as the cornerstone of a Hindu nationalist renaissance in India.

According to local sources, activists energized on the eve of the consecration ceremony climbed on top of the four churches and prayer halls in Jhabua, shouting Jai Shri Ram (“Hail Lord Ram”), a frequent battle cry of Hindu nationalists, and planted saffron flags on the roofs.

The Government will quickly introduce legislation to extend widows and widowers’ pensions to surviving members of unmarried relationships with children.

The move comes after the Supreme Court ruled it was an unconstitutional breach of equality to offer a State pension to couples stemming from their marriage but not to individuals from unmarried relationships when children are involved.

In a statement, the Government said Minister for Social Protection Heather Humphreys and Attorney General Rossa Fanning were examining the judgment, including what legislation would be required to comply with it. This will be done “with all expediency”, the statement said.

The Government is expected to provide payment of the WCP to bereaved unmarried parents. The Supreme Court litigant, Mr O’Meara, by virtue of his legal action, will be entitled to the WCP and should get backdated payments but other bereaved unmarried parents are expected to get prospective payments only.

The court’s ruling relies on the fact that Mr O’Meara is a bereaved parent. Sineád Lucey of the Free Legal Advice Centres, which represented Mr O’Meara, took the view that any entitlements of bereaved childless cohabitees would require a separate determination in an appropriate case.

A shooting at a Catholic Church in Istanbul yesterday has left one person dead.

The extreme Islamist group, ISIS, has claimed responsibility for the atrocity.

Two gunmen wearing black balaclavas entered the Church of St. Mary in the Sariyer district during Mass shortly before noon local time, killing a Turkish citizen named Tuncer Cihan.

After a brief manhunt, Turkish authorities arrested two suspects in the assault, saying one was from Tajikistan and the other from Russia, and that both have ties to ISIS.

Amid mounting concern of an anti-Christian “genocide” in Nigeria, a human rights group has accused the country’s security forces of being more concerned with protecting cows than Christians and other non-Muslims.

In a new report, the International Society for Civil Liberties and the Rule of Law also accused security forces of engaging in disappearances and extra-judicial killings.

A principal cause of sectarian violence in Nigeria has been tension between largely Muslim herdsmen from the Fulani ethnic group, and sedentary farmers who tend to be mostly Christian. A series of attacks by Fulani gunmen on Christian targets over the Christmas holidays, for example, left an estimated 300 people dead.

According to the report, whenever there’s a perceived threat to cattle owned by Fulani herdsmen, Nigerian security forces swing into action.

The rapid military response results in “arrests, abductions, disappearances and ‘neutralisation’” against the killers or attackers, according to the report, but a similarly aggressive response doesn’t occur when Fulani herdsmen and bandits, often dressed in black and shouting jihadist slogans, attack Christians and other non-Muslims.

The proposed change to the Constitution “devalues marriage” and risks putting polygamy on a par with monogamy, according to Senator Ronan Mullen.

Speaking in the Oireachtas in the debate on the upcoming referendum on the family, Senator Mullen said the proposal devalues marriage as it “equates the rights of a family based on marriage to those persons in a durable relationship and a durable relationship the Minister cannot define”.

“As far as I can see, despite protestations to the contrary… we are potentially placing polygamous relationships on a par.”

He added: “They are not entered into in Ireland because polygamy is illegal in Ireland but perhaps the ban on polygamy will be found to be repugnant to the Constitution in the light of this constitutional change in the future.”

The full meaning of durable relationships would be interpreted by the courts in “hard cases”, using a wide range of measures including whether others send the partners a Christmas card, the chair of the Electoral Commission has said.

There is ongoing debate about whether polygamous and polyamorous relationships would be covered in the proposed expanded concept of the family, among other relationships, in the upcoming referendum.

Ms Justice Marie Baker said terminology introduced into the Constitution had to be “specific but not too specific,” to allow for examples “that haven’t yet been considered”.

She added that interpretation of what was a durable relationship would be somewhat subjective.

“There are all kinds of things, some of them are subjective and some of them are objective. So subjectively, a relationship is durable, if committed, if it presents itself as committed, if it means to be committed, if it intends to be committed.

“Its durability can sometimes be how you are treated by other people. Are you are you invited as a couple to weddings? Do people send Christmas cards to both of you? These are the indicators of your commitment to each other,” she added.

A coalition of women’s groups opposed to the stance of the National Women’s Council of Ireland (NWCI) has called for No votes in the forthcoming referendums.

About 30 members of the Silenced Protest group staged a flash demonstration outside the Mansion House in Dublin on Thursday where the NWCI launched its Yes campaign for both referendums.

Among the organisations represented at the protest were the Irish Women’s Lobby, Women’s Space Ireland and The Countess.

Silenced Protest said a Yes vote was based on a “lie” that article 41.2 states that a “woman’s place in the home”.

“The Constitution states that the State will strive to prevent women having to work outside the home if she doesn’t want to do that,” Irish Women’s Lobby founder Helen Duignan said.

“What unites us all is to maintain a woman or a man’s right to choose whether or not to work outside the home. What they should be putting into the Constitution is the word ‘parents’ that they will not be forced out of the home due to economic necessity. That’s been missed.”

The Medical Council has defended the removal of an instruction not to deliberately kill a patient from its latest ethics code claiming the move had nothing to do with legislative proposals for ‘assisted dying’. However, the move does mean that if the Government does legislate for euthanasia, nothing in the new ethics code will prevent doctors from using their medical skill to kill willing patients.

The Council’s president, Dr Suzanne Crowe, told the Joint Committee on Assisted Dying that the change, has been “misinterpreted,” adding that it “was not the Medical Council taking a stance or paving the way for any possible future change [to the law]”.

“The removal of this sentence does not diminish the law,” she said, adding that the council “does not have a position” on euthanasia.

The guide is “not a legal code. It’s principles-based guidance,” she told Independent Senator Rónán Mullen, who had asked why such a substantial and long-standing section had been removed, something which could be seen as “convenient” by those advocating for Voluntary Assisted Dying (VAD).

“There was no specific consultation in relation to this issue,” she conceded, noting that the council’s ethics committee had proposed the removal, which the council then ratified.

Former Minister for Justice Michael McDowell has questioned the need for a referendum to expand the definition of family in the Constitution after the Supreme Court extended some spousal entitlements to unmarried parents.

Mr McDowell told the Seanad that the Government’s proposals would see other “durable relationships” given the same status as marriage and he questioned whether this was either necessary or desirable.

He also questioned whether a durable relationship could include more than two people. Addressing Minister for Equality Roderic O’Gorman he said: “if it is, don’t just airily dismiss throuples or bigamy or polygamy or polyandry.”

Mr O’Gorman claimed in the Dáil last week that the proposals would not cover such relationships.

Mr McDowell said that in briefings to Oireachtas members Mr O’Gorman had suggested the definition would be determined in the courts.

He said this matter should be for the Oireachtas to decide and said it is “bad politics” to “say pass this legislation, and we’ll find out later what it means”.

Mr McDowell also argued that holding the referendum on March 8th, International Women’s Day, was a “worthless cheap gimmick” that means the legislation is being “rushed through” the Oireachtas.