Following a hearing in February, the European Court of Human Rights ruled in June that the European Convention on Human Rights does not  obligate member states to extend the right to marry to same-sex couples. The ruling in Schalk and Kopf v. Austria was announced with this press release;  the court’s judgment is available here.

Austria has allowed same-sex couples to register partnerships (since January 1, 2010) but does not allow same-sex marriage, and the court concluded that this approach fell within the margin of appreciation allowed for legislation under the Convention. Three of the seven judges filed a dissenting opinion, embracing the court’s conclusion that the notion of “family life” under the Convention extends to same-sex couples, and asserting that the court should have found a violation of the Convention because Austria “did not advance any argument to justify the difference in treatment.”   A webcast of the hearing is available here .  

Also: here’s a report from Jurist at the University of Pittsburgh: Germany court recognizes foreign same-sex marriage as civil union.