The Federal Supreme Court unanimously refuses to remove the indication of gender from birth and civil status registers.
There will still not be an empty gender entry in Switzerland.
The Swiss person residing in Germany who asked for the gender entry to be deleted will continue to be referred to as man or woman in official Swiss documents.
This is a first judgment in this regard.
Specifically, the person demanded that the Aargau authorities delete the gender entry from the register. The plaintiff was born with ambiguous sex characteristics and does not identify as either a woman or a man.
Legend:
The Federal Supreme Court has made a first judgment in this matter: A blank space in the gender entry is not possible in Switzerland in the civil status register.
REUTERS/Archive/Denis Balibouse
Possible in Germany
On presentation of a medical certificate, she obtained from the German authorities in 2019 the change of her first name and the deletion of all information under the gender heading.
The federal court relied on the current law, which makes it impossible to keep an empty entry in the civil register or a third gender. Not even for people who already have another entry abroad, as was the case here.
No fundamental decision on binary gender system
open box close the box
However, this is not a fundamental decision on a binary gender system, it was a specific legal question, says the Federal Supreme Court. The Federal Council and Parliament would first have to change the laws.
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