Slovenian voters on Sunday repealed a
law that would have allowed a gay person to adopt the biological
children of a partner, the AP reported.
The country's previous center-left
government last year approved a family law which included the right.
The law also gave gay couples in a registered partnership, available
since 2006, many of the rights and protections of marriage.
The conservative group Civil Initiative
for Family and Children's Rights forced a national referendum on the
law by collecting 42,000 signatures. The group argued that gay and
lesbian couples should not be given the right to adopt children.
Roughly 55 percent of voters rejected
the law, and 45 percent supported it.
Religious leaders in the Roman
Catholic, Serbian Orthodox and Muslim communities backed the law.
“Marriage and family are the utmost
importance for the development of the human person and society,”
the leaders said in a joint statement. “For this reason, we all
have an obligation to protect the values of marriage and of family as
a community of a husband and a wife, and children.”