Taiwan’s parliament passed Asia’s first marriage equality law overnight as more than 40,000 stood in the streets outside the legislature. Taiwan is the first Asian country to legalize marriage between same-sex couples.
The Guardian reports: “Lawmakers on Friday comfortably passed part of a bill that would allow gay couples to enter into “exclusive permanent unions” and apply for marriage registration with government agencies.”
The NYT adds: “The legislature faced a deadline imposed by Taiwan’s constitutional court, which in 2017 struck down the Civil Code’s definition of marriage as exclusively between a man and woman. The court gave the government two years to revise the law, or same-sex couples would automatically be allowed to have their marriages registered by the local authorities.”
Taiwan’s president, Tsai Ing-wen, who campaigned on a marriage equality platform, celebrated on social media after the vote: “We took a big step towards true equality, and made Taiwan a better country.”
