Britain's most senior judge has said he has sympathy with those who resort to assisted suicide when they face a painful and lingering death.
The president of the new Supreme Court, Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers told the Daily Telegraph that it was a "very difficult area" of law.
He said: "I have enormous sympathy with anyone who finds themselves facing a quite hideous termination of their life as a result of one of these horrible diseases, in deciding they would prefer to end their life more swiftly and avoid that (prolonged) death as well as avoiding the pain and distress that might cause their relatives."
He acknowledged that the "strongly held beliefs" of different groups would inevitably cause clashes.
He told the newspaper: "I don't believe it's possible to say one view is right and the other wrong."
But Lord Phillips also said that he doubted that a change in the law to allow assisted suicide would do anything to bring a "more satisfactory answer".
