Germany holds first gay marriages
TWO German men made history yesterday by becoming the first same-sex couple to marry after decades of struggle, but campaigners say the battle for equal rights is not over.
Wedding bells rang out in Berlin, Hamburg, Hanover and other German cities where local authorities exceptionally opened their doors on a Sunday, allowing weddings on the day the law came into effect.
Bodo Mende, 60, and partner Karl Kreile, 59, exchanged their vows at a desk decked out with white flowers and rainbow flags.
Then, they turned to offer a shot of their first embrace as a married couple to the throng of photographers and TV crews from around the world who packed the south Berlin registry office alongside friends and family.
“I’m unbelievably satisfied, this is extremely symbolic to be recognised as a completely normal couple and no longer to have a second-class marriage,” Kreile said after the two cut a rainbow cake.
Mende and Kreile, longtime gay marriage campaigners who have been together since 1979, wanted to tie the knot as soon as possible – after being among the first to enter a civil partnership back in 2002.
The dash to exchange vows comes three months after lawmakers voted to give Germany’s 94 000 same-sex couples the right to marry, following a shift in position by Chancellor Angela Merkel.
“Finally, equal law for equal love,” tweeted Justice Minister Heiko Maas, as Germany became the 15th European nation to legalise gay marriage.
The Netherlands led the way in 2000, followed piecemeal by other European countries including Spain, Sweden, Britain and France. Same-sex relationships have become so normalised that polls show about 75% of Germans are in favour of gay marriage.
“It’s a marvellous day. We’re all feeling festive and happy,” lawmaker and Social Democratic Party (SPD) gay and lesbian affairs commissioner Johannes Kahrs said from Hamburg, where he was best man at the wedding of two friends.
“But we would gladly have had it sooner. Thank you for nothing, Frau Merkel,” he added – the reproach he flung at Merkel in a stormy speech in parliament when the law was passed.
By extending existing law to same-sex pairs, Germany’s gay couples automatically gain the same tax advantages and adoption rights as heterosexual families.
Along with Germany’s Greens party, the gay and lesbian rights organisation LSVD began its battle for equal marriage rights in about 1990.