Two male soldiers who say they were forced out of their jobs at Argentina's Air Force hospital because they are a couple have filed suit against the Ministry of Defense with backing from the National Institute Against Discrimination.

Leonardo Pini, a doctor, and Oscar Arcas, a clerk, are demanding that Pini be re-hired or given an Air Force pension.

The new Social Democrat/Green coalition government in Hamburg, Germany, is promising equal rights for same-sex couples.

Among the pledges: access to public housing, hospital-visitation rights that supercede the wishes of blood relatives, a city partnership-registration scheme, and city approval of gay adoption and immigration of foreign gay partners.

A preacher in Norway's state Lutheran Church has been suspended for marrying her female lover.

Siri Sunde faces a final decision by the church hierarchy in a few weeks, but in the meantime Church Affairs Minister Jon Lilletun and Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik have suggested she resign.

Norway is one of four nations where gays and lesbians can enter registered partnerships that grant all the rights of matrimony except access to adoption, church weddings and artificial- insemination services. But the state church continues to refuse ordination to people who make use of the 'gay marriage' law.

A new statue of 19th century gay author Oscar Wilde has gone up in Dublin, Ireland's Merrion Square.

Wilde lived half his life in the city.

The multi-color monument is made of granite, jade, porcelain and quartz. Two black columns, one topped by a pregnant women and the other by a naked male torso, are engraved with some of Wilde's witticisms.