Thai MPs voted overwhelmingly in favor of him today marriage of same-sex couplesa first in Southeast Asia, according to images broadcast by its television station Parliament.

The text is a significant step forward, but it still needs to go through the Senate before it was finally made the law of the state by the king. The process is expected to take several weeks, if not months.

“Today Thailand took another step towards equality among people,” said Danuporn Punakanda, a spokesman for the prime minister’s party.

The country could become the first Southeast Asian country to recognize same-sex unions, and the third in Asia after Taiwan and Nepal.

The LGBTI+ community is highly visible in the country known for its values ​​of tolerance, but laws seen as conservative still fuel discrimination against same-sex couples or transgender people.

The bill approved by MPs aims to amend references to “men”, “women”, “husband”, “wife” in the Marriage Act to replace them with terms that do not refer to gender.

The new legislation will give same-sex couples procreation and inheritance rights.

“It’s a huge step for our country,” Mukdapa Youngjuenprandorn, a spokeswoman for the human rights group Fortify Rights, told AFP. “I hope that the last step will go smoothly, and that Thailand will be on the same level as the rest of the world in terms of LGBTI+ rights,” he said.