October 2, 2025
“Assisted suicide is a human right”
Brave Citizens fight for control over end of life: “Assisted suicide is a human right”
A sit-in at Utrecht Central Station marks the prelude to next Monday’s appeal by Coöperatie Laatste Wil (Last Will Cooperative) against the State to make assisted suicide legal. “Large groups of people are currently being left out in the cold.”
The Brave Citizens Support Group is holding a sit-in at Utrecht Central Station on Wednesday byHaro Kraak.
Most passers-by at Utrecht Central Station walk on by, but Zep (21) stops and takes a moment to look at the scene. What he sees: a group of elderly people dressed in white in a kind of sitting area, with houseplants and side tables, a baby and a dog lying on the carpet.
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‘Sign for End-of-Life Care!’ say the flyers they are handing out. ‘Assisted suicide is a human right!’
Zep, a broadly smiling boy with black curls, doesn’t need to know much more. He scans the QR code, signs the petition and makes a donation. “My grandmother is also elderly,” he says. “I think it’s great that these people in their 70s and 80s are standing here and drawing attention to this issue. They have a good energy.”
He has just graduated and is now working; he can spare a donation.
His signature helps to ensure that the End-of-Life Care Bill will eventually be debated in the House of Commons.
Once 40,000 signatures have been collected, the House is obliged to put the citizens’ initiative on the agenda. “We now have almost 40,000,” says initiator and psychologist Wim van Dijk (81). “But we will continue until we have many more, because that will have more impact.”
Autonomy first
The bill, which Van Dijk wrote together with lawyers and ethicists and which is supported by well-known Dutch figures such as Adriaan van Dis, Alexander Pechtold, Dick Swaab and Hedy d’Ancona, is an alternative to the current euthanasia law, which they consider too strict.
Autonomy is paramount: the wishes of the individual are leading, not the judgement of the doctor.
Under the new system, every mentally competent adult should have the option of euthanasia, regardless of the reason. This process is carried out by a specially trained end-of-life counsellor. They conduct several interviews with the person making the request and check that there is no external pressure.
‘The proposal doesn’t go far enough for me,’ says Catrien Rijk, as she hands out flyers. ‘I am in favour of complete autonomy. That you can simply pick up the lethal drug at the pharmacy. As far as I’m concerned, you don’t have to answer to anyone, because you don’t do it just like that.’
The Brave Citizens Support Group is holding a sit-in at Utrecht Central Station. Elderly people are demonstrating for the right to decide how they die in the Netherlands. Students from the conservatory are providing musical accompaniment.Source Photo Raymond Rutting / de Volkskrant
This sit-in, which takes place on Wednesday at the security gates at both ends of the hall of Utrecht Central Station, is organised by the Brave Citizens Support Group, an activist group loosely affiliated with Coöperatie Laatste Wil (CLW), which launched the lethal Drug X in 2017.
‘I don’t want to spend my last days like a plant,’ says Joop In den Haak (85), one of the protesters. He lives opposite a nursing home where he sees people with dementia who are very dependent on care. ‘Then I don’t want to go on any longer.’
Fundamental right
‘Ultimately, I want to go in the Sarco,’ says Jacqueline Rietbergen (70). ‘I think that’s the ultimate autonomous route. You lie down in the capsule and press the button yourself. No one else can do it. The nitrogen that fills the cabin puts you out of consciousness within a few minutes, and you don’t notice anything about death.’
The only question, she says, is to what extent the use of the Sarco is currently punishable by law. “So perhaps the law needs to be stretched first.”
That works out well; the protest in Utrecht is a prelude to the appeal that CLW has lodged against the State, which will be heard on Monday at the Court of Appeal in The Hague. CLW wants to force recognition that self-determination at the end of life is a fundamental right. Assisted suicide, currently a criminal offence, should therefore become legal.
In the first instance, at the court hearing in December 2022, the judge ruled against CLW, but on one important point he agreed with the argument of lawyer Tim Vis: it follows from the European Convention on Human Rights that everyone has the right to determine whether, when and how their own life ends.
However, according to the judge, that right to self-determination is sufficiently guaranteed in the current euthanasia law.
That is a misconception, says Catrien Rijk. “I was also shocked on Friday by Henri Bontenbal, who many people seem to be voting for, who said on NPO 2 that the euthanasia law should not be broadened and that the group wishing to end their lives is very small. There are really large groups that are currently being left out. And they sometimes resort to horrific methods.”
