Hawaii is on its way to becoming the seventh US state with a civil unions law after the bill, which grants gay and lesbian couples the same rights and benefits the state provides to married couples, was approved by lawmakers on Wednesday and is awaiting the signature of the governor.
In his first column this year, Fridae’s legal columnist George Hwang discusses the courage and right to love, and challenges those who are celebrating the Lunar New Year to either invite his or her partner to family celebrations or to show him or her to a friend.
Two men in Beijing have reportedly held a "comparatively open" wedding ceremony with about 50 friends in attendance as reports quote a HIV/AIDS prevention volunteer and emcee at the wedding as saying that same-sex marriages will help reduce the chances of HIV infection among gay men.
Criticised in the past for declining to support gay marriage, Finance Minister Penny Wong – who’s Australia's first openly gay cabinet member – spoke in favour of a motion which calls on her party to support the legal right of same-sex couples to be married.
In the first case of its kind, a 20-something transgender woman who brought a legal case against the government in the hopes of establishing her right to marry her boyfriend has lost her case.
The issue of marriage equality has intensified in the lead up to Saturday's election with Prime Minister Julia Gillard and her opponent Tony Abbott repeatedly challenged on the issue.
Costa Rica's top court on Tuesday ruled that a planned public referendum on same-sex civil unions is illegal thus blocking the electoral tribunal from holding a referendum that would have let voters decide if same-sex civil unions should be allowed in the largely Roman Catholic country.
President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner on Wednesday convened a ceremony at the Casa Rosada government house in downtown Buenos Aires to formally sign into law a bill making Argentina the first country in Latin America to legalise marriage for same-sex couples.
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