Denmark OKs
gay adoption
Denmark, which enacted the world's first same-sex civil-union law in 1989, extended adoption rights to gay couples March 17.
Parliamentarians voted for the measure 62-53, with 64 legislators not present.
The bill was supported by the opposition Social Democrats and Socialist People's Party. The ruling Liberal Party opposed it, though seven Liberal MPs broke ranks and voted for it.
Denmark's groundbreaking 1989 "registered partnership" law granted same-sex couples more than 99 percent of the rights and obligations of marriage—a model that later was copied by several other European nations.
Beginning in 2001 with the Netherlands, gay couples began gaining access to marriage itself. Same-sex marriage now is possible in Belgium, Canada, the Netherlands, Norway, South Africa, Spain and the U.S. states of Connecticut and Massachusetts.
From June to November 2008, gays in California also could marry, until voters amended the state constitution to stop it. The constitutionality of the amendment, known as Proposition 8, is now being reviewed by the California Supreme Court.
CoE, HRW: Serbia
needs to protect gays
Thomas Hammarberg, the Council of Europe's human-rights commissioner, said March 11 that Serbia is doing a bad job of protecting gay people.
"Discriminatory statements made by political figures and the media go largely unpunished," he said. "Human rights activists in particular are victims of intolerance, hate speech and threats, sometimes resulting in physical attacks. Such instances must be condemned from the highest political level and sanctioned appropriately."
Founded in 1949, the Council of Europe seeks to develop common democratic principles based on the European Convention on Human Rights and other texts. Forty-seven nations are members of the body.
On March 10, Human Rights Watch urged Serbia to relaunch efforts to pass a gay-inclusive anti-discrimination bill that recently was removed from active consideration in Parliament following objections from the Serbian Orthodox Church.
Homophobic
bullying 'rife' in
British schools
A YouGov survey of more than 2,000 primary and secondary school teachers has revealed that homophobic bullying affects more than just the 150,000 gay pupils in British schools, the gay lobby group Stonewall reported March 10.
The "Teachers Report" found that boys who work hard, girls who play sports, young people with gay parents and young people who are presumed to be gay all experience anti-gay harassment.
Findings included:
—Nine in 10 secondary school teachers and two in five primary school teachers said pupils experience homophobic bullying even if they are not gay.
—Homophobic bullying is the most prevalent form of bullying after bullying because of weight.
—The vast majority of incidents go unreported by pupils.
—Forty-three percent of secondary school teachers and three in 10 primary school teachers have heard anti-gay remarks by other school staff.
—Nine in 10 teachers have received no training about homophobic bullying.
"This survey reveals how much remains to be done by our schools to demonstrate to all pupils that homophobic bullying is unacceptable," said Stonewall Chief Executive Ben Summerskill.
HRW: Cayman Islands
should protect gays
The Cayman Islands, a British overseas territory, should revise a draft constitution that will be submitted to voters May 20 to ensure it protects everyone from unequal treatment, and the British government should ensure this happens, Human Rights Watch said March 11 in letters to Caymanian Gov. Stuart Jack and British Foreign Secretary David Miliband.
The draft constitution will eliminate a free-standing guarantee of equality before the law and limit anti-discrimination protections only to rights expressly included in the constitution.
"This means that large and critically important areas of daily life would not be covered, including access to jobs, housing, and medical treatment," HRW said. "Reportedly, the government succumbed to pressure from religious groups, and the action was apparently intended to deny protections to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people."
Boris Dittrich, advocacy director of HRW's LGBT Rights Program, accused the British government of "using a double standard, approving a draft constitution for an overseas territory that gives fewer protections than British citizens enjoy at home."
—Assistance: Bill Kelley
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