The Canadian province of Manitoba will not defend the federal marriage laws in a court case where three same-sex couples have demanded the right to marry.

Same-sex couples already have won access to marriage, via court order, in the provinces of British Columbia, Ontario and Quebec and in the Yukon Territory.

“We will not be defending the federal law,” provincial Justice Minister Gord Mackintosh told the Canadian Press wire service Aug. 25. “We don’t have an interest in opposing legally recognized rights of Canadians. … The weight of the decisions across the country have pointed to the conclusion that the current federal law is not in accordance with [Canada’s] Charter [of Rights and Freedoms].”

The federal government has promised to legalize same-sex marriage everywhere as soon as the Supreme Court answers some questions that the government has submitted regarding the matter.

Seven thousand anti-gays marched on the New Zealand Parliament Aug. 27.

They traveled to Wellington from all over the country to oppose the pending civil-unions bill, abortion, prostitution law reform and a lowered drinking age.

“The cornerstone of any nation is family,” said Destiny church movement founder Brian Tamaki, according to the New Zealand Herald. “And the cornerstone of any family is marriage. You cannot touch what God has ordained.”

All dressed in black, the protesters chanted, “Enough is enough” and punched the air with their fists, said The Dominion Post newspaper.

A group of 1,500 GLBTs counter protested.

“I feel like I’m at a Nuremberg rally,” said Georgina Beyer, a transgender member of Parliament.

Eleven out gays and lesbians are known to have participated in the Summer Olympics in Athens and seven of them won medals.

According to the website Outsports, openly gay Olympians included American equestrians Robert Dover and Guenter Seidel, British equestrian Carl Hester, New Zealand equestrian Blyth Tait, British hurdler Rob Newton, French tennis player Amélie Mauresmo, American tennis player Martina Navratilova, Spanish tennis player Conchita Martínez, Dutch swimmer Johan Kenkhuis, German fencer Imke Duplitzer and German cyclist Judith Arndt.

Arndt won a silver medal in the women’s road race, Mauresmo won a silver medal in women’s singles tennis, Martínez won a silver medal in women’s doubles tennis, Dover and Seidel won bronze medals in equestrian team dressage, Duplitzer won a silver medal in women’s team epee, and Kenkhuis and his teammates won silver medals in the men’s 4x100 freestyle relay.

The son of a former president of Colombia is among the founders of a new national GLBT political organization.

Virgilio Barco, son of former President Virgilio Barco Vargas, came out this month in conjunction with the inauguration of the Proyecto Colombia Diversa group.

Barco’s partner, Andrew Dier, is also working with the organization.

The armed forces joined a British Pride celebration for the first time Aug. 28.

Eight officers from the Royal Air Force (RAF) rode on a float in Manchester’s Pride parade in hopes of recruiting new members.

Gay sex was banned in the British military until last year.

“The RAF tries to reflect the community from which it draws its members,” an RAF spokesperson told the BBC. “We have recruitment policies that recognize that people from different backgrounds can make positive contributions. An individual’s sexual orientation is none of the RAF’s business.”

A new ban on gay sex has taken effect on the island of Zanzibar, which is part of the African nation of Tanzania.

Sex between men is punished with 25 years in prison and sex between women is punished with seven years in prison.

President Amani Karume signed the measure into law in mid-August.

Tanzania already criminalizes homosexuality nationwide but the law is rarely enforced.

Zanzibar is predominantly Muslim, and Islamic groups have been pressing for a more puritanical legal code.

Canada’s top dictionary, the Canadian Oxford Dictionary, has added numerous gay words and phrases to its new edition, the Washington Blade reported.

They include: bareback, bi-curious, cottaging, civil union, co-parent, cruisy, gaydar, GLBT, glory hole, homoerotic, leatherman, lesbigay, lipstick lesbian, rainbow flag, queeny, she-male, tranny, trans and transgendered.

Cottaging, which means cruising or having sexual contact with another male in a public toilet, is not in use in U.S. English. The term likely crossed over from the United Kingdom.

The Canadian dictionary also redefined “marriage” as “the legal or religious union of two people.”

Three Canadian provinces and one territory have legalized full same-sex marriage and the federal government plans to open up the institution nationwide.