Same-Sex Partnership Systems Spreading in Japan

Tokyo, Feb. 15 (Jiji Press)--An increasing number of prefectural and municipal governments in Japan are introducing same-sex partnership systems, with local leaders pinning hopes on progress in national discussions on related issues.

Following discriminatory remarks against LGBT people by a recently dismissed secretary to Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, human rights issues for sexual minorities are now being debated at the Diet, the country's parliament.

The proportion of people in areas where same-sex partnership systems are introduced in the country's total population reached 65 pct as of Jan. 10, according to a survey by Tokyo's Shibuya Ward and Nijiiro Diversity, a nonprofit organization based in the city of Osaka, western Japan.

Same-sex partnership systems allow couples of the same sex to be officially recognized by local governments as being equivalent to married couples and to obtain related certificates. These certificates make same-sex partners eligible for moving to family-use public housing and visiting each other at public hospitals.

Local governments that have introduced the systems are calling on private-sector institutions to give similar treatment to same-sex couples.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]