Andorra lawmakers extend civil marriage equality to same-sex couples
Lawmakers in Andorra on Thursday voted unanimously to extend civil marriage rights to same-sex couples. Andorra is a small country known for its ski areas that is nestled between Spain and France in the Pyrenees.
Media reports indicate the new Andorran family code that lawmakers approved eliminates the legal differences between married heterosexual couples and gays and lesbians who have entered into civil partnerships. “Today we are voting on a law for everyone, which includes all of us,” said Carles Enseñat, president of Andorra’s Democratic Parliamentary Group, before the vote. “[It is] a law of a modern country that ensures the free development of citizenship and bases its success on the most primordial organizational nucleus — the family — with all its diversity.” Spain and France are among the European jurisdictions in which same-sex couples can legally marry.
The Slovenia Constitutional Court earlier this month ruled a law that limited marriage and adoption rights to heterosexual partners is unconstitutional.
Switzerland’s marriage equality law took effect on July 1. It is not immediately clear when Andorra’s new family code takes effect.
