Greece’s parliament voted on Thursday to pass a bill legalising same-sex marriage and giving same-sex couples full parental rights.
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis posted on X:
The vote has passed: as of tonight, Greece is proud to become the 16th EU country to legislate marriage equality. This is a milestone for human rights, reflecting today’s Greece — a progressive, and democratic country, passionately committed to European values.
The legislation divided political opinion in the country, and was strongly opposed by some conservatives and the influential Christian Orthodox Church.
About a third of members of Mitsotakis’ ruling conservative New Democracy party abstained or voted against the bill, but it passed with the support of three centre-left and left opposition parties – a rare case of cross-party support in the country’s parliament.
However, the bill also caused divisions within progressive parties, showing how divided the legislature is in Greece. A third of members of the socialist Pasok party abstained from voting, as well as three MPs from the leftist Syriza party and two from the New Left.
A total of 176 MPs backed the bill in the 300-seat parliament, 76 voted against it and the rest abstained. The vote made Greece the first Orthodox country to legalise same-sex marriage.
The bill allows same-sex couples to adopt children and gives both parents the same rights as legal guardians of the child. However, the bill still does not give same-sex couples the right to surrogacy.
Same-sex civil partnerships have been allowed in Greece since 2015. But this gave custody rights only to the biological parents of children in such relationships, leaving their partners in a bureaucratic limbo.
Opinion polls show that most Greeks support the reform by a small margin, and the issue has not caused deep divisions in a country more concerned about the high cost of living.
