NewsWrap for the week ending January 12, 2002 (As broadcast on This Way Out program #720, distributed 1-14-02) [Written by Cindy Friedman, with thanks to Graham Underhill, Chris Ambidge, Brian Nunes, Jason Lin, Rex Wockner, Lucia Chappelle and Greg Gordon] Anchored by Cindy Friedman and Christopher Gaal The South African government has acted to extend spousal benefits to the same-gender partners of gay and lesbian military personnel. Newly published amendments to regulations of the South African National Defence Force will bring them into line with South Africa's constitution, which was the first in the world to guarantee equal treatment for gays and lesbians. They specify that "marital status" now includes "a relationship ... involving ... reciprocal support ... with a person of the same ... sex," as well as heterosexual common-law marriages. A "partner in a permanent life partnership" can be recognized as a "spouse" by means of a declaration before a notary public. In Israel, the Tel Aviv City Council voted this week to recognize gay and lesbian and other unmarried couples as family units. The pioneering bill introduced by openly lesbian City Councilmember Michal Eden grants them family discounts for city-sponsored cultural and educational activities such as day care and municipal services including use of sports facilities. Although conservative religious groups are working against the measure, Tel Aviv Mayor Ron Huldai supports it and has ordered its implementation once some details have been worked out. A private members bill to create legal registered partnerships was introduced in Britain's House of Lords this week by Liberal Democrat Lord Lester. It's scheduled for initial debate later this month. It would provide for registry for unmarried couples, regardless of gender, who have lived together for at least six months. Registration would confer legal standing in areas including taxation, social security, pensions, inheritance, healthcare, wrongful death compensation, and domestic violence protections, but would not extend parental or adoption rights. Passage seems unlikely since the Conservative Party opposes it and the Labour Government has not indicated support for it. The Government is believed to be drafting its own partnership bill but has not made it a priority. In Canada, the Justice Ministry of the conservative province of Alberta this week recommended legal recognition of gay and lesbian couples. The recommendation came as part of a review of provincial family laws and would bring Alberta into line with rulings by the Supreme Court of Canada. For years Alberta has used both provincial and federal courts to vigorously oppose equal treatment of gays and lesbians, despite the protections of the national Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Justice Ministry is now accepting public input on its proposal, which the religious right has vowed to fight. In what's believed to be a "first" for Brazil, a court this week granted a lesbian non-biological co-parent temporary custody of her deceased partner's child. Co-parent Eugenia Vieira has won 6 months' custody of the 8-year-old son of her partner of 14 years, the late rock star Cassia Eller. The boy's biological father died before he was born, and Eller's family did not object to Vieira taking custody. Because Eller was often on the road, even before her death in December the boy had actually spent more time with Vieira. Luis Mott of Brazil's Grupo Gay da Bahia told Reuter's that, "The case represents a change in the ideology dominant in Brazil. It's a shift away from the right of blood to the right of the heart." In the U.S., the Pennsylvania state Supreme Court has found that a lesbian former co-parent is in fact a parent under state law. In a 5-to-2 decision two weeks ago, the state high court ruled that the lesbian co-parent known as "TB" has standing to sue for visitation with the biological child of her former partner known as "LRM". The child was born by artificial insemination in 1992, when the couple had already been together for several years, and they raised her together until they broke up in 1996. "LRM" has since denied "TB" any contact with the girl, including winning a stay pending appeal of a 1997 trial court order that granted "TB" visitation. A trial court will now determine if "TB" will get to see the child. U.S. President George W. Bush this week signed into law a major education reform bill that includes only a much-diluted version of what had been an explicitly anti-gay rider. As proposed by North Carolina Republican Senator Jesse Helms and originally passed by the House of Representatives, the rider would have denied federal funds to any school refusing access to the Boy Scouts of America or other groups that discriminate based on sexual orientation. But the final version of the law is not specific to "sexual orientation" and essentially only restates the existing Equal Access Act prohibiting "viewpoint discrimination" in after-hours use of public school facilities. GLSEN, the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network, is writing to schools to clarify that this does not require that schools promote or offer special deals to the Scouts or other groups discriminating against gays and lesbians. Other victories for gay and lesbian lobbyists were elimination of a parental consent requirement for student counseling services and continued support for hate crimes prevention programs. A Jordanian family in Utah who kidnapped and viciously assaulted their own adult daughter because she is a lesbian, will not serve time for their crimes. The father, mother and two brothers of Muna Hawatmeh had been charged with aggravated kidnapping and aggravated assault and could have faced sentences of 15 years to life. But in a diversion agreement made public this week, they are only required to avoid contact with the woman and to commit no further crimes over the next two years. According to her testimony, in October 1999 they beat her for four hours and were going to kill her until she convinced them to send her back to Jordan instead. Prosecutors were convinced that relatives there would have killed her. As her brother was driving her to the airport, her lover saw them and called the police. But despite Muna's fear of her family, she still loves them and did not give prosecutors much cooperation. The U.S. embassy in Moscow last week issued an unusual warning to U.S. citizens living there in the wake of eight brutal murders of gay men in the past two years. Four of the victims were Russians, while the others were an American, an Australian, a Briton, and a German. While this week's notice only urged "caution," a December cable from the embassy to the State Department said, "We believe we may have uncovered a disturbing pattern of murders of foreign gay men in Moscow." While at least some of the killings appear to be linked to the popular gay club Kazarma, known for its sex workers, Russian officials insist there is no connection among them. The U.S. embassy claims the murder investigations had been dropped, but the prosecutor's office denied that. Forty years after founding his own fashion house, the legendary designer Yves Saint Laurent this week announced his retirement at the age of 65. He first publicly identified himself as a gay man in a 1991 interview with "Le Figaro". He did not exaggerate when he told a press conference that he "created the wardrobe of the contemporary woman" and "participated in the transformation of my times." He's credited with pioneering the women's pantsuit in the 1960's and as "Madame Figaro" magazine's Danielle Mazinguard told the BBC, "He really liberated women's bodies. He made a lot of clothes for women that looked like men's clothes and suddenly women were able to wear a lot of clothes they could not before." Also announcing his retirement this week was the Church of England's Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey. He'll be stepping down at the end of October after more than a decade as head of the global Anglican Communion and 40 years as a priest. Carey held to a traditional line on issues including recognition of same-gender relationships and ordination of homosexually-active clergy, and for years refused even to meet with gay and lesbian Anglican activists. Among those seen as the top three candidates to succeed Carey is Bishop of Wales Rowan Williams, a theologian whose sympathy for gay and lesbian clergy has already outraged conservative Anglicans. And finally... Italian activists are demonstrating this weekend in memory of gay Alfredo Ormando, who in 1998 dramatically set himself afire outside the Vatican to protest its homophobia. Ormando died as a result of his self-immolation and is viewed by some as a martyr for gay and lesbian civil rights. The Italian group ArciGay is now demanding that the Vatican recognize Ormando as a saint. Given Roman Catholicism's rejection of both homosexual acts and suicide, there seems little chance of sainthood for the dissident Ormando. But the media Web site Tabloidbaby.com suggested this week that another gay Catholic may be a viable candidate: New York City Fire Department chaplain Mychal Judge, who died a hero in the September 11th attack on the World Trade Center. Tabloidbaby editor Burt Kearns wrote, "Through our analysis of the coverage, we hear the drumbeat for sainthood. The Vatican doesn't ignore such mass adulation in the press."