Transgender woman fights for right to marry in Hong Kong

[Butterfly]

Transgender woman fights for right to marry in Hong Kong
Hosted by Google
09 August, 2010


http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gjSKARcB24DfsRt8aOf5Tqmo2t_g


HONG KONG — A transsexual took the Hong Kong government to court on Monday in an unprecedented bid to marry in her new gender.

Lawyers for the Chinese woman, who is in her 20s and known only as "W" under anonymity rules, told the court that a law banning her from marrying her boyfriend is unconstitutional and violates her basic rights.

The woman is one of a small number of people to have undergone sex change surgery in a Hong Kong public hospital, and had her sex altered on her identity card.

But the city's Registrar of Marriages ruled last year that she could not marry her boyfriend because her birth certificate -- which could not be changed under Hong Kong law -- says that she is still a man.