NORWEGIAN GAYS MARRY AFTER CHANGE IN LAW

Friday after Norway became the second country in the world to
bring in a law permitting the official registration of homosexual
partnerships.

    "More, more," shouted a crowd of around one thousand people
when the five couples who married left the Oslo registrar's
office. NTB news agency said 10 Christians who staged a protest
against the ceremony were hardly noticed.

    Norway refuses to call the ceremony a marriage, but the only
difference between a partnership and marriage is that gay couples
are not allowed to adopt children.

    "The judicial and economic regulations are otherwise
identical with matrimony. Only Denmark has a similar law," said
Vidar Kildahl, spokesman at the ministry of children and family
affairs.

    Grete Berget, minister of children and family affairs, later
met the newly-wed couples, both male and female, at a reception
in central Oslo.

    The ritual itself, which takes place at the public
registrar's office, is almost identical with that of marriage.