Supporters and opponents of a referendum on amending the Civil Code to legalize same-sex marriage on Thursday staked out their positions in a televised forum ahead of the vote on Saturday next week.
New Power Party Executive Chairman Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) and Tseng Pin-chieh (曾品傑), a professor at National Chung Cheng University’s College of Law, presented opposing views on the referendum, which is to ask voters if they agree to amend the Civil Code to guarantee the marriage rights of same-sex couples.
The code defines marriage as between a man and a woman, but Huang, a proponent of the referendum, said that social ethics would not be affected if it is amended to cover same-sex couples.
Enacting a separate law to guarantee their rights, as is advocated by anti-LGBT rights forces, cannot confer marriage equality rights promised by the Council of Grand Justices’ Constitutional Interpretation No. 748, he said.
The court ruled that provisions in the code that exclude marriage between people of the same sex violate people’s freedom of marriage and their right to equality as guaranteed by Articles 22 and 7 of the Constitution respectively.
Huang said that because the code is the main law governing family and marriage, it should be used to protect same-sex marriage rights.
He also disagreed with his opponents’ claim that amending the code would be too complicated, saying it would only require changing five articles.
Establishing a separate act would be far more complicated and run the risk of missing important details, he added.
Tseng argued that the interpretation did not specifically state that Part IV of the Civil Code that covers family was unconstitutional.
Instead, it found that the law fails to protect the right of gay and lesbian people to live together, and therefore a separate act is needed to complement the Civil Code, he said.
The code governs marriage and family relationships based on the premise of unions between a man and a woman in ways that cannot be applied to same-sex marriage, Tseng said.
That includes the presumption of legitimacy, which states that the husband of a woman is the father of the child to whom she gives birth, he said.
Beijing could eventually see a full amphibious invasion of Taiwan as the only "prudent" way to bring about unification, the US Department of Defense said in a newly released annual report to Congress. The Pentagon's "Annual Report to Congress: Military and Security Developments Involving the People's Republic of China 2025," was in many ways similar to last year’s report but reorganized the analysis of the options China has to take over Taiwan. Generally, according to the report, Chinese leaders view the People's Liberation Army's (PLA) capabilities for a Taiwan campaign as improving, but they remain uncertain about its readiness to successfully seize
Taiwan is getting a day off on Christmas for the first time in 25 years. The change comes after opposition parties passed a law earlier this year to add or restore five public holidays, including Constitution Day, which falls on today, Dec. 25. The day marks the 1947 adoption of the constitution of the Republic of China, as the government in Taipei is formally known. Back then the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) governed China from Nanjing. When the KMT, now an opposition party in Taiwan, passed the legislation on holidays, it said that they would help “commemorate the history of national development.” That
Trips for more than 100,000 international and domestic air travelers could be disrupted as China launches a military exercise around Taiwan today, Taiwan’s Civil Aviation Administration (CAA) said yesterday. The exercise could affect nearly 900 flights scheduled to enter the Taipei Flight Information Region (FIR) during the exercise window, it added. A notice issued by the Chinese Civil Aviation Administration showed there would be seven temporary zones around the Taiwan Strait which would be used for live-fire exercises, lasting from 8am to 6pm today. All aircraft are prohibited from entering during exercise, it says. Taipei FIR has 14 international air routes and
Snow fell on Yushan (Jade Mountain, 玉山) yesterday morning as a continental cold air mass sent temperatures below freezing on Taiwan’s tallest peak, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Snowflakes were seen on Yushan’s north peak from 6:28am to 6:38am, but they did not fully cover the ground and no accumulation was recorded, the CWA said. As of 7:42am, the lowest temperature recorded across Taiwan was minus-5.5°C at Yushan’s Fengkou observatory and minus-4.7°C at the Yushan observatory, CWA data showed. On Hehuanshan (合歡山) in Nantou County, a low of 1.3°C was recorded at 6:39pm, when ice pellets fell at Songsyue Lodge (松雪樓), a
RSS