The Swiss vote yes to same-sex relationships and "Schengen/Dublin"
Sunday, June 5, 2005
The Swiss people have voted a double yes in referenda to the proposals over same-sex partnerships and the Schengen/Dublin bilateral agreements. Overall they voted 58.03% for the same-sex partnerships and 54.60% for Schengen/Dublin.
The referendum of allowing the registration of same-sex partnerships was widely welcomed with the people voting 58.03% Yes and 41.97% No. Same-sex partnerships are already legal in the cantons of Geneva and Zürich. The partnerships would carry many of the legal rights of marriage, with the exception of adoption rights and fertility treatments.
The referendum of the Schengen/Dublin bilateral agreement was initially accepted, despite growing resentment with the electorate. It was passed through with the people voting 54.60% Yes and 45.40% No. The agreement relaxes existing border controls between other participating nations in concert with the Schengen treaty, which is one of the competences for inclusion in the European Union.
The bilateral agreement also includes participation in the Dublin treaty, which defines a policy for handling asylum seekers within Schengen participating countries. Also stipulated by the agreements is the use of a unified "European Informatic System" for tracking people who are wanted, missing, or are illegal immigrants and also aims to stop traffic of illegal or stolen property.
Out of the big 4 main parties the centre-left Social Democrats, the liberal-right Free Democrats and the centre-right Christian Democrats have said yes to both proposals, however the populist-right Swiss People's Party have said no to both proposals.
Related News
[edit]
Sources
[edit]- "Swiss vote to join Schengen area" — SRI/Swissinfo, June 5, 2005
- "Swiss vote to ease border control" — BBC News, June 5, 2005
- "Texts Bilateral Agreements II Switzerland–EU from 25 October 2004" — Integration Office of Switzerland website,
The text of this article has been released into the public domain. In the event that this is not legally possible, this article may be used for any purpose, without any condition, unless such conditions are required by law. This applies worldwide. Copyright terms on images, however, may vary, so please check individual image pages prior to duplication. Please note that this only applies to Wikinews content created prior to September 25, 2005. All content created after that date is released under a Creative Commons license which is mentioned at the bottom of each article. This is currently the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License. |