Slovakia’s parliament instituted a constitutional ban of same-sex partnerships, Bloomberg News reported this June. The ban was accompanied by a memo stating its purpose was to make it “impossible for the rights and duties associated with marriage to be conferred in any way other than a legally recognized union between a man and a woman,” according to Buzzfeed.com. The Slovak Spectator reported that a December pastoral letter from the bishops’ conference had denigrated same-sex partnerships as “sodomitic mockery.”

Prime Minister Robert Fico’s government championed the amendment, but it also instituted a new committee for the LGBT community in the largely Catholic country where homosexuality is still considered taboo, Reuters reported.