Taiwan Church News
3405 Edition
29 May – 4 June, 2017
Topical News The Council Of Grand Justices Rules Restrictions Unconstitutional On Same-Sex Marriage Reported by Chen Yi-fan In the afternoon on May 24, in an international press conference held by Taiwan’s Judicial Yuan, whose general secretary Lu Tai-lang announced an epoch-making ruling of Constitutional Interpretation No. 748, a 24-pages document on whether current Taiwan’s administrative restrictions on same-sex marriage based on article 972 of the Civil Code are constitutional or not, indicating that these restrictions are unconstitutional as these administrative measures are evidently against the principles of freedom and equality specified in the Constitution. The ruling of the Council of Grand Justices also requires the parliamentary or the government have to deliver or amend relevant laws necessary to protect same-sex marriage within two years; otherwise, it should be legal automatically for same-sex couple to register their union at household registration offices when two years’ time is up. Taiwan, as the first Asian country to recognize same-sex marriage, certainly attracted lots of high-light attentions from the world-wide media and international communities, but there were still some unyielding oppositions against same-sex marriages from a grand union of religious groups even after the ruling of Grand Justices had been unveiled. These religious leaders claimed that the justice is dead, and they would send ghost money to the Council of Grand Justice to express their ever strongest furies! Translated by Peter Wolfe |