[“NewsWrap" for the week ending June 21, 2008 (As broadcast on "This Way Out" program #1,056, distributed 6-2308) [Written by Greg Gordon, with thanks to Rex Wockner with Bill Kelley] Reported this week by Leigh Moore and Erica Springer More than 6,300 couples got marriage licenses across California during the first week gay and lesbian couples could legally do so. According to a survey of all 58 counties by the “Los Angeles Times,” that was more than double the number of licenses issued during a typical week in June. The first same-gender couple to marry in San Francisco soon after 5:00 p.m. on Monday, June 16th, the exact time that the state Supreme Court ruling came into force, were pioneering lesbian couple Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon, in a private City Hall ceremony conducted by San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom. A brief press conference and public celebration followed, including the cutting of a wedding cake. Longtime lesbian comic and activist Robin Tyler and her partner Diane Olson were the first to wed in Southern California at about the same time, in a Jewish ceremony on the steps of Beverly Hills City Hall, where they'd gone for each of the past 8 Valentine's Days seeking a marriage license. This time, they got one. They were among several same-gender couples whose combined lawsuit resulted in the historic May 15th state high court marriage equality ruling. The vast majority of gay and lesbian couples - including a small number from out of state - began getting their licenses on Tuesday morning, June 17th. We'll have a lot more on this story - with on-scene reports from both Northern and Southern California during the first few days of wedded bliss - later in the program. About 250 conservative Christian ministers from across New York staged a noisy demonstration this week at the state Capitol in Albany to protest Democratic Governor David Paterson's directive requiring state agencies to recognize same-gender marriages legally conducted elsewhere. That now includes California, where - unlike Massachusetts - there's no residency requirement. A number of Republican lawmakers also attended the rally. Paterson issued his directive last month after a state appeals court ruled that a lesbian couple's marriage in Canada should be recognized in New York. His order affects more than a thousand laws and regulations, from pensions to state tax filings to child custody laws. And perhaps inspired by California's nuptials, Tasmanian minority Green Party M.P. Nick McKim said this week that he'd introduce marriage equality legislation in the state parliament when it begins its next session on July 1st. Tasmania was the first Australian state to create a same-gender relationships registry in 2004 that provides many of the rights of marriage. There's disagreement between Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's administration, which insists that marriage laws are a federal matter, and at least a few constitutional experts in the country, who believe that the states are free to establish their own. Like the government of his predecessor John Howard, Rudd's administration quashed a civil unions bill in the Australian Capital Territory earlier this year because they would have been too much akin to marriage. Some legal scholars, however, say that the federal government does not have the same veto power over state legislation. In possibly the only pro-LGBT action during the two terms of U.S. President George W. Bush, his Department of Justice this week ordered the Social Security Administration to recognize the children of same-gender couples. The determination reasoned that while the federal Defense of Marriage Act - or “DOMA” - bans recognizing or providing benefits to same-gender couples, it doesn't specifically prohibit benefits to the children of those couples. The opinion cites the case of two Vermont women who entered into a civil union in 2002 and wanted to pass on the non-biological parent's disability benefits to their child, who was born in 2003. Elsewhere, discrimination based on sexual orientation was included in a new Law on Equal Treatment passed this week by the Lithuanian parliament. Religious institutions are exempted. MPs had originally removed age, disability, and sexual orientation from the new law, which covers the provision of goods and services, but now inclusively-conforms to European Union anti-discrimination policies. A law banning discrimination based on sexual orientation in employment, passed in 2004, helped Lithuania's bid to join the European Union. In another country formerly controlled by the now-defunct Soviet Union, three leading gay and lesbian rights groups in the Ukraine have formed the Union of Gay Organizations of Ukraine. The Gay Alliance, Gay Alliance Cerkasy, and Nash Mir Gay & Lesbian Center say the move will minimize administrative costs and improve their advocacy efforts. The Ukraine continues to seek E.U. membership, but there are questions about its commitment to human rights. The Ukraine parliament's ironically-named Committee on the Issues of Freedom of Speech has attacked "increasing propaganda" about gay and lesbian issues, saying in a recent report that "Such a situation obliges organs of state power to adopt determined and urgent steps for stopping popularization of homosexualism, lesbianism, [and] other sexual perversions, which do not correspond to moral principles of the society.” LGBT groups from Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka have created a network to work jointly on issues that arise in their individual countries, according to a report in the “Jakarta Post”. Representatives of the groups met for five days in early June on the Indonesian island of Bali. A spokesperson for the Indonesian group “Rainbow Flag” told the “Post” that LGBT people in those nations face similar problems of discrimination, stigmatization, and persecution from religious groups. And finally, the creators of a new Jamaica-based Web site hope it will help lesbigay people in the Caribbean more easily communicate with each other. Rainbow-vibes-dot-com is described by its founders, a gay Jamaican IT manager who now lives in Canada and a lesbian marketing executive who lives on the island, as "an online hub for Caribbean gay, lesbian, [and] bisexual individuals living at home and overseas, in addition to the many others across the globe." Members can create and join discussion groups, add music and videos, chat, find dates, write blogs, and read news from the Caribbean and the world. While Jamaica is notorious for being one of the most homophobic countries on earth, LGBT people face varying degrees of hostility and prejudice across the Caribbean.