Same-sex marriage in Belgium Same-sex marriage in Belgium On 1 June 2003, Belgium became the second country in the world to legalise same-sex marriage, after the Netherlands. "Statutory cohabitation", open to any two legally consenting cohabiting persons, is also possible since 1 January 2000. In 1995, a bill was introduced in Parliament to provide for a legal framework of "cohabitation agreements". It was mostly intended as a response to the lowering marriage rates, rather than giving rights to same-sex couples. In 1998, the bill was changed to "statutory cohabitation" (; ; ) and finally voted on. The Chamber of Representatives approved it by a
Recognition of same-sex unions in Estonia of same-sex marriages or partnerships". On January 4, 2006, five Estonian NGOs supporting LGBT rights issued a press release asking for the Government to draft a new partnership law to give same-sex couples equal rights with opposite-sex couples. On the other hand, a number of conservative politicians claimed that Estonia was not yet ready for same-sex marriage, and that there was no need to create a separate law on same-sex unions since existing laws already implied the protection of some of these unions, despite not mentioning same-sex unions explicitly. Väino Linde, the chief of the Constitution Commission of the Riigikogu