BEIJING, Feb. 20 (UPI) -- Cambodia's 81-year-old king would like same sex marriages allowed in his native country, the BBC reported Friday.
King Norodom Sihanouk, in Beijing for medical treatment, expressed his views on his personal Web site after watching images of thousands of U.S. homosexuals getting married in San Francisco.
Sihanouk said that as a "liberal democracy," Cambodia should allow "marriage between man and man... or between woman and woman."
He said he had respect for gay men and lesbians and said they are as they are because God loved a "wide range of tastes."
Such views are not widespread in Cambodia, but the king is hugely revered although he is a constitutional monarch and has no executive powers.
San Francisco has issued more than 2,800 marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples in the past week in defiance of California law.
