A Hong Kong court on Friday upheld a government policy which denies civil partnerships to same-sex couples.

In the city’s first-ever case on civil partnerships, the Court of First Instance ruled against the woman applicant – known only as MK. She filed a legal challenge against the government last June, arguing that the ban on same-sex civil partnerships was unconstitutional. However, Judge Anderson Chow said that the government did not violate MK’s constitutional rights in denying her same-sex marriage, or in its failure to provide a legal framework for recognising same-sex relationships, such as civil unions.

In his 41-page judgment, Chow said he was taking a “strict legal approach” in deciding the case, even though he was aware that people in society have “diverse and even diametrically opposed views.”

Chow said that the definition of marriage under the Basic Law clearly referred to heterosexual ones.

“The evidence before the court is not, in my view, sufficiently strong or compelling to demonstrate that the changing or contemporary social needs and circumstances in Hong Kong are such as would require the word ‘marriage’ in Basic Law Article 37 to be read as including a marriage between two persons of the same sex,” Chow wrote.

“It is obvious that were the court to ‘update’ the meaning of ‘marriage’ to include… same-sex marriage, it would be introducing a new social policy on a fundamental issue with far-reaching legal, social and economic consequences and ramifications,” he added. Read more via HKFP