ITALY
Yahoo! News
Rob Waugh
Hundreds of gay marriages have been annulled in Italy by a panel led by a Catholic judge in the secretive Opus Dei organisation.
Same-sex marriage is not technically legal in Italy, but several left-wing mayors have registered marriages which have been conducted abroad.
Judges at Italy’s highest appeal court, the Council of State, annulled a ruling in favour of cities that had registered these unions.
The panel was led by a judge who was a former president of a halls of residence in Milan, run by Opus Dei.
The move has caused controversy – Opus Dei, made famous by Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code, is a highly conservative organisation, whose members practice a ‘pious’ lifestyle.
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