Greek MPs are preparing to legalize, on Thursday February 15, 2024, homosexual marriage and adoption by same-sex couples.
Despite opposition from the Orthodox Church and the right wing of the ruling party, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis defended the bill.
Since 2015, only civil union has been accessible to same-sex couples in Greece, and for those with children only the rights of the biological parent are recognized.
There is little doubt about the adoption of legalization, with the measure widely supported by several parties, including Syriza, led by Stefanos Kasselakis, the first openly gay Greek politician who has just celebrated his union in the United States.
Greece could thus become the 21st country on the continent (and 16th country in the European Union) to adopt legislation recognizing the union of same-sex couples.
In 2000, the Netherlands opened the ball
The Netherlands was the first country in the world to have legislated in this direction with a law adopted on December 21, 2000. Many European states quickly followed its example: first Belgium, in 2003, then Spain two years later, Norway and Sweden in 2009, Portugal and Iceland in 2010, Denmark (incidentally the first country to have introduced civil unions for same-sex couples in 1989) in 2012, the France in 2013, Luxembourg in 2014 and Finland the same year (where the law finally came into force in 2017).
In the United Kingdom, England and Wales celebrated their first same-sex marriages in 2014. Scotland adopted the law the same year, while Northern Ireland would not adopt it until 2020. Regarding Ireland, same-sex marriages have been authorized since 2015: it is the first country in the world where the law, enshrined in the Constitution, was adopted by referendum.
Then Germany and Malta followed suit in 2017, Austria in 2019, Slovenia (where a referendum to this effect had previously been rejected in 2015) and Switzerland in 2022, Andorra in 2023 and Estonia, since January 1, 2024. The latter became the first country that belonged to the USSR to adopt a law recognizing same-sex marriage.
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In other countries on the continent, same-sex couples can enter into a civil union, but do not have the right to marry: in the Czech Republic since 2006, in Hungary since 2009, in Liechtenstein since 2011, in Croatia since 2014 , in Greece and Cyprus since 2015, and in Italy since 2016. Only Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia, Romania and Bulgaria do not recognize any form of union for same-sex couples.
From the east to the west of the continent, a still divisive subject
Thus, while same-sex marriage is now almost authorized everywhere in Western Europe, Central and Eastern Europe remain largely opposed to it.
32% of Poles and 27% of Hungarians say they are in favor of adopting equal marriage, according to surveys conducted between 2015 and 2016 by the Pew Research Center.
Some countries, such as the Czech Republic, are more favorable to it (65%), but only civil union is currently accepted.
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Other countries, on the contrary, firmly reject any development.
In parallel with the adoption of homosexual marriage in the West since the 2000s, many Eastern countries have on the contrary modified the definition of marriage in their Constitution, restricting it to the union between a man and a woman, like Hungary in 2012 or Croatia in 2013. Croatian justice nevertheless granted in 2021 the right to people of the same sex to adopt children.
Poland, notoriously unfavorable to any change in this area, nevertheless saw the beginning of a development when the regional administrative court in Warsaw rejected the unconstitutional nature of same-sex marriage.
The recent arrival to power of pro-European Donald Tusk risks further shaking things up: the new Prime Minister announced on January 24, 2024 that he wanted to
“liberalize”
abortion, in particular by allowing access to the morning-after pill.
On Tuesday February 12, the presenters of a public news channel, TVP Polonia, apologized to LGBT+ people for degrading comments that may have been made against them in recent years.
“Today, for the first time on Polish television, after 8 years of right-wing government, LGBT+ activists appeared live
,” said Bart Stazewski, guest of the show, on X.
In Hungary, led since 2010 by Viktor Orban, a notorious apostle of
“illiberal democracy”
, the simple act of mentioning homosexuality in front of minors has been punishable by a fine since the summer of 2021. Since 2018, studies of gender and adoption by homosexual couples are also prohibited.
Some countries could be forced to modify their legislation in this area, such as Romania, called in September 2023 by the ECHR to promote the legal protection and recognition of LGBT people within the country, ruling in favor of the 21 families who filed the petition. European body.
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And in the world ?
In total, 35 countries recognize same-sex marriage in the world, according to the Pew Research Center (the report indicates 34 but has not yet taken Estonia into account, Editor's note).
The vast majority of these countries are European, to which are added an increasing number of states from the American continent.
In 2017, Taiwan became the first country in Asia to legislate in this direction starting in 2017 with a Supreme Court ruling, which ultimately resulted in legalization in 2019.
In Japan, after a first legal victory in 2021, the courts finally ruled in June 2022 by declaring that the non-recognition of the unions of same-sex couples was not an attack on the constitution.
On the African continent, only South Africa adopted equal marriage in 2006.