Court appeal against Hong Kong refusal to recognise overseas same-sex marriages fails
- Court of Appeal throws out bid to give same-sex couples the same rights to marriage as heterosexual ones
- Judges’ panel rules marriage applies only to opposite sex couples under city’s mini-constitution
A human rights activist has lost an appeal against a Hong Kong court’s refusal to recognise his New York-registered same-sex marriage.
Three appeal judges on Wednesday dismissed Jimmy Sham Tsz-kit’s argument that same-sex couples had the same right to marriage as heterosexual couples.
The Court of Appeal ruled that the city’s mini-constitution granted access to the institution of marriage only to opposite sex partners and that the government had no obligation to recognise same-sex unions.
The judges also found that successful legal challenges to discriminatory policies in recent years did not justify a “short-cut” to avoid constitutional restraints that denied LGBT people the right to marry in Hong Kong.
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Sham, at present in custody over subversion charges in connection with allegations he took part in an unofficial legislative primary election in 2020, asked for a judicial review in 2018.
He complained that it was unfair that he could not enjoy the same marital benefits as heterosexual couples. Sham married in the US five years before the legal challenge was launched.