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''Oliari and Others v. Italy'' (Application nos. 18766/11 and 36030/11) is a case decided in 2015 by the
European Court of Human Rights The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR or ECtHR), also known as the Strasbourg Court, is an international court of the Council of Europe which interprets the European Convention on Human Rights. The court hears applications alleging that a c ...
(ECtHR) in which the Court established a
positive obligation Positive obligations in human rights law denote a State's obligation to engage in an activity to secure the effective enjoyment of a fundamental right, as opposed to the classical negative obligation to merely abstain from human rights violations. ...
upon member states to provide legal recognition for same-sex couples.


Background

The ECtHR previously held in '' Schalk and Kopf v. Austria'' (2010) that the Convention does not oblige member states to open marriage to same-sex couples, but if there is a different type of partnership scheme, same-sex couples may not be excluded per '' Vallianatos and Others v. Greece'' (2013). Same-sex marriage is not legal in Italy, nor did the country at the time of the case provide any other type of recognition for either opposite-sex or same-sex couples. The applicants were six Italian men (three same-sex couples) who submitted their cases in 2011 after Italian courts rejected their application to marry.


Judgment

The Court held that Italy violated
Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights provides a right to respect for one's "private and family life, his home and his correspondence", subject to certain restrictions that are "in accordance with law" and "necessary in a democratic ...
("Right to respect for private and family life") with the lack of legal recognition of same-sex relationships. In the review of relevant law, the Court also referenced ''
Obergefell v. Hodges ''Obergefell v. Hodges'', ( ), is a landmark LGBT rights case in which the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the fundamental right to marry is guaranteed to same-sex couples by both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection ...
'' a United States Supreme Court ruling legalising same-sex marriage, which was published just a few days before the ECtHR deliberated in ''Oliari and Others v. Italy''. However, the ECtHR found that, despite the evolution of states in favour of legalising same-sex marriage, there is no violation of Article 12 (right to marry), and thus confirmed its previous ruling in '' Schalk and Kopf v. Austria'' (2010).


Aftermath

In May 2016, almost one year after the Court's ruling, the
Italian Parliament The Italian Parliament ( it, Parlamento italiano) is the national parliament of the Italian Republic. It is the representative body of Italian citizens and is the successor to the Parliament of the Kingdom of Italy (1861–1943), the transitiona ...
passed a law officially introducing civil unions for same-sex couples. Those unions provide the same rights as marriage, with the exception of adoption rights. The law came into effect in June of the same year.


See also

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Recognition of same-sex unions in Europe Recognition may refer to: *Award, something given in recognition of an achievement Machine learning *Pattern recognition, a branch of machine learning which encompasses the meanings below Biometric * Recognition of human individuals, or biomet ...
*
Recognition of same-sex unions in Italy Italy has recognised same-sex civil unions ( it, unione civile); german: eingetragene Lebenspartnerschaft; sc, unione civile; lld, uniun zivila; sl, civilna zveza. since 5 June 2016, providing same-sex couples with most of the legal protections ...
*
List of LGBT-related cases before international courts and quasi-judicial bodies This list contains cases of the European Commission of Human Rights, European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), Inter-American Court of Human Rights, Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), European ...


References


External links


Court judgment
2015 in case law 2015 in LGBT history Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights European Court of Human Rights cases involving Italy Same-sex union case law {{law-stub