Lithuanian lawmakers agree to consider same-sex partnership bill

Transfer to greenlight additional dialogue of the proposal comes a yr after Lithuania’s parliament voted down the same piece of laws.

An April 2021 ballot discovered 70 % of Lithuanians oppose same-sex partnerships [File: Mindaugas Kulbis/AP]

Lithuania’s parliament has voted to simply accept a draft invoice legalising same-sex civil partnerships for additional debate, after voting down the same invoice in Could 2021.

Seventy lawmakers voted in favour and 52 in opposition to accepting the measure for dialogue on Thursday, with a number of opponents elevating questions on whether or not legalising same-sex partnerships would go in opposition to Catholic teachings.

Proponents have been mildly inspired however acknowledged that challenges lay forward with regard to the passage of the invoice within the strongly Catholic nation.

“My emotions are combined after the vote,” Elzbieta Latenaite, an overtly bisexual actress and activist, advised reporters in parliament.

“On the one hand, the parliament took a step in direction of Europe, in direction of Western values. However however, there’s nothing joyous that even such a restrained invoice can not cross with out a huge combat, with highly effective homophobes hurling insults at residents who need equal rights,” she stated.

An April 2021 ballot discovered that 70 % of grownup Lithuanians oppose same-sex partnerships.

“Similar-sex union is a sin, whichever approach we take a look at it”, stated opposition MP Algimantas Dambrava in the course of the heated dialogue in parliament.

‘The pure idea of the household’

Three in 4 Lithuanians determine as Roman Catholics, and the top of the native church physique advised lawmakers to remain away from such partnerships as they threat altering “the pure idea of the household”.

In a nod to critics, the same-sex invoice not defines partnerships as an “emotional connection” or permits companions to imagine a standard surname.

“The legislation may higher defend human dignity, however help was wanted and this was the bottom threshold potential,” stated Gabrielius Landsbergis, head of the ruling Homeland Union social gathering.

The lawmakers can even debate another same-sex couple laws, dropping partnerships – seen by some proponents as too much like marriage – for the precise for any cohabitating folks to legally declare “a detailed connection” between them.

The nation of two.8 million folks, as soon as dominated by Moscow, has been a member of the European Union and NATO since 2004.