French lawmakers have unanimously approved a bill aimed at abolishing the concept of 'conjugal duty' after criticism from women's rights groups that it ignores the idea of sexual consent and allows for rape in marriage, France24 reported.
The text, supported by more than 120 members of the lower house of the National Assembly, clarifies in the Civil Code that cohabitation does not obligate spouses to have sexual relations. The cross-party bill now has to pass through the upper house of the Senate.
The French Civil Code lists four duties associated with marriage: fidelity, support, assistance and cohabitation. It does not mention sexual obligation, but older court decisions sometimes interpreted cohabitation as "sharing a bed," allowing the idea of "conjugal obligation" to persist in practice.
For example, in 2019, a man in France filed for divorce on the grounds that his wife had stopped having sex with him. Last year, the European Court of Human Rights ruled in favor of his ex-wife, stating that a woman who refuses to have sex with her husband should not be considered "guilty" by the courts in the event of a divorce.
France also adopted the principle of consent in defining the crime of rape last year, following the example of other European countries such as the Netherlands, Spain, and Sweden.
As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, the United Kingdom is introducing a ban on the use of artificial intelligence to generate intimate images of people who have not given permission.
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