Fierce debate over same-sex marriage in Lower house

There were fierce debates in parliament on Thursday over amending Czechia's Civil Code to include marriage between same-sex couples. Martin Exner from the Mayors and Independents (STAN) coalition party said that the anti-gay marriage stance is supported by Russia, that Russia supports these "culture wars" and is trying to divide society, and that Czechia has the choice of either becoming part of a free Western Europe or an eastern European conservative periphery state.

More conservative legislators from the opposition ANO party, as well as from the Christian Democrat and Civic Democrat parties, which are both part of the ruling coalition, objected to his statement, accusing him of labelling anyone who opposes gay marriage as pro-Russian. The opposition SPD party plans to vote to reject the bill, saying that it does not want to interfere with the institution of marriage, preferring to amend registered partnership.

Similar to when the bill was discussed in the last election period, the debate was not brought to a conclusion on Thursday and the Lower house will return to it at a later date, which, according to the Czech News Agency, will be in two weeks at the earliest.