North Macedonia’s parliament adopted the Anti-Discrimination Law, which among other things guarantees protection from gender-based discrimination.
The previous governments led by the conservative right-wing VMRO DPMNE from 2006 to 2017 refused to include sexual orientation in the law. It was then originally passed by the Social Democrat-led majority in 2019. However, the Constitutional Court struck down the law in May this year, to the dismay of LGBT organisations and human rights groups, ruling that it was not passed with a proper quorum in parliament. The Law now passed in parliament with 69 out of 120 members of the parliament supporting it, from both ruling and opposition parties. No MPs voted against it.
Prior to the vote in parliament, the Network Against Discrimination, which comprises many prominent North Macedonian NGOs, criticised the government’s recent decision to dismiss its proposal to add stricter rules for a more transparent and inclusive procedure to elect members of the Anti-Discrimination Commission, which the government said is already part of the law.
