Norway's Parliament in a 84 to 41 vote
Wednesday approved a new gay marriage law. The law, which goes into
effect at the end of the year, places the country in the company of
only six others where gay marriage is legal – Spain, Canada, South
Africa, Belgium and the Netherlands.
The new law also allows gays to adopt
children and permits lesbians to be artificially inseminated.
“I am extremely pleased that we
managed to get this last stage passed. Now we have to tackle the
prejudice which still exists in society,” Norwegian Finance
Minister Kristin Halvorsen said after the vote.
Outside the Parliament, a handful of
protesters objected to the new law.
Homosexuality had been outlawed in the
country of nearly five million as early as 1972. Norway adopted
civil unions for gay & lesbian couples in 2003.