WORLD BRIEFING / GREECE
A Greek court annulled Greece’s only two same-sex marriages, officials said, following a furious backlash against the ceremonies from the government and religious leaders.
The two couples -- one male, one female -- exploited a loophole in a 26-year-old law that did not specify gender in civil weddings, and were married last June by the mayor of the small Aegean Sea island of Tilos. The ceremonies drew the wrath of the powerful Orthodox Church of Greece, with one conservative bishop denouncing them as weddings of “humanoid couples.”
The government immediately declared the marriages illegal and invalid.
Elsewhere in Europe, Sweden, the Netherlands, Norway, Belgium and Spain allow gay marriages.
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