TAIPEI: Tens of thousands of people packed Taipei’s streets on Saturday in Asia’s biggest gay pride parade, wearing colourful costumes and carrying rainbow flags as they called on Taiwan’s new government to legalise same-sex marriage.

Many of the attendees were hopeful that same-sex marriage would soon become a reality under the pro-gay ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which is in control of parliament for the first time.

Taiwan is one of the region’s most forward-thinking societies when it comes to gay rights, but progress on marriage equality has remained stagnant, because of resistance from the Kuomintang (KMT) party, which dominated politics for decades before being unseated by the DPP in May.

President Tsai Ing-wen has also openly supported marriage equality and said she would respect any decision reached by parliament.

“Even though my role has changed, my values remain unchanged,” she wrote on her official Facebook page on Saturday.

Published in Dawn October 30th, 2016