At the United Nations, the General Assembly has approved a historic measure supporting gay rights worldwide. On Thursday, sixty-six countries voted to approve a declaration calling for the decriminalization of homosexuality and guaranteeing equal rights for gays, lesbians and transgendered people. Most of the support came from Europe and Latin America. The Bush administration refused to support the measure, joining Russia, China, the Vatican and several Arab states. Maxime Verhagen, the Netherlands’ Minister of Foreign Affairs, criticized the US objection.

Maxime Verhagen: “What we say is that Universal Declaration of Human Rights means that they have also to be applied for homosexual, bisexual and transgender people. And we are not saying that people should behave like certain people behave. We don’t say that we should apply a certain lifestyle. What we say is you don’t use this as an excuse to discriminate against them, to violate their human rights or to penalize them. So I hope that also the US will be the next time one of the countries who will support this statement.”

The Bush administration says it opposed the measure, because it could have been interpreted to override state bans on gay marriage. The declaration is the first on gay rights to be read in the General Assembly.