News Briefs

The Italian Senate passed on Feb. 25 a controversial bill that grants legal recognition to nonmarried heterosexual and homosexual couples, after sponsors removed a clause that would have allowed a nonbiological parent in a homosexual union to adopt the biological children of his or her partner. • A Canadian parliamentary committee recommended on Feb. 25 that physician-assisted suicide be allowed for people with psychiatric conditions and children younger than 18 and that physicians who object to assisted suicide be required to make a referral for such action. • About half the refugees from Mozambique at a crowded camp in the village of Kapise, Malawi, have contracted malaria, said Rufino Seva, the Malawi country director for the Jesuit Refugee Service. • Archbishop Robert Carlson of St. Louis has formed a new committee for girls’ formation after expressing ongoing concerns in a letter on Feb. 18 that the policies of Girl Scouts USA and the London-based World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts were in “conflict with Catholic values.” • About 150 former pupils and boarders at the former Montreal Institute for the Deaf who were sexually abused between 1940 and 1982 will share $21.6 million after their class action lawsuits were settled in mid-February.