'Spouse or Life Partner' Ministry Wants to Enshrine Gay Rights in Law{germany}

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2. Good news; but there is an important caveat here:

while Germany (and perhaps the wider EU) will be obligated to legally recognize a civil union as equal to a marriage, jurisdictions outside Germany will not be so obliged.

At the same time, if gay couples were allowed to form marriages just as heterosexual couples do, then that would give gay relationships more standing. That doesn't mean that, for example, Iran would agree to treat such a couple as a marriage; but it does mean that at some point or other, governments would be pressured (implicitly and explicitly) to conform the two.

K&R