Hong Kong Must Have Framework to Recognize Same-Sex Unions, Court Rules
Hong Kong’s top court ruled on Tuesday that the city’s government must establish a framework to legally recognize same-sex partnerships, delivering a partial victory to L.G.B.T.Q.
activists. The ruling underscores how Asia’s conservative landscape is evolving when it comes to gay rights. However, the five judges on Hong Kong’s Court of Final Appeal stopped short of recognizing same-sex marriage, something activists had been demanding.
In 2019, a Hong Kong court ruled against allowing same-sex unions in the city, a decision that came five months after Taiwan’s government became the first in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage.
The ruling on Tuesday said that “an alternative framework” was needed to provide those in same-sex partnerships “with a sense of legitimacy, dispelling any sense that they belong to an inferior class of persons whose relationship is undeserving of recognition.” The plaintiff in the case was Jimmy Sham, a pro-democracy activist who has been fighting for the recognition of same-sex marriages registered overseas for five years, according to The Associated Press.
