Argentina's Chamber of Deputies (la
Camara de Diputados) has approved a gay marriage bill, news agency
Telam reported.
The country's lower house approved the
bill in a 125-to-109 vote.
Lawmakers debated between moving on a
bill that would give gay and lesbian couples the right to marry –
including the right to adopt – and a civil unions bill that did not
include gay adoption.
Agustin Rossi, the head of the Front
for Victory Party (Frenta Para la Victoria, FPV) in the Chamber of
Deputies, said: “We are equaling rights in the most genuine
manner.”
Rossi said he rejected the civil unions
bill because it “would not have solved the problem.”
“The civil unions bill was something
in between. It was not the same as marriage, it was further
stigmatization, continue saying: they are different, they can do to a
point, the remainder is reserved for us.”
“Heterosexuals have to have the
wisdom to integrate minorities. It is very unfair to have the power
and say, with my power: you cannot, I do not want you to be equal to
me,” he added.
Lawmakers had tentatively agreed to
debate the bill last week but proponents failed to gain sufficient
support to open debate.
Nestor Kirchner, Argentina's former
president and a current national deputy, was present for the debate
and said he supported the bill. Kirchner relinquished control of
Argentina in 2007 when he handed the reigns of power to his wife,
Christina Fernandez de Kirchner. He currently helms the powerful FPV
and represents Buenos Aires Province in the lower chamber.
Gay marriage has remained in the
national conscious since December when two men married for the first
time in Latin America. Last week, a
gay couple married in Buenos Aires, the men were the fifth couple
to do so.
The bill now heads to the Senate.