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The European Union has threatened to withhold funding for the almost 100 cities, towns, and provinces that previously made the declaration. 

Yollada "Nok" Suanyot has won election as the top financial officer in Thailand's Nan province, making her the nation's highest-ranking transgender politician.

Andre Boisclair, the out gay newly elected head of Quebec's separatist party, has promised to hold a quick referendum to pull Quebec out of Canada if he becomes premier of the French-speaking province.

The Episcopal diocese of San Joaquin in California has sued a deposed bishop, demanding he vacate his offices and turn over financial accounts for leading a secession last year prompted by the church's ordination of women and gays. The diocese said in its lawsuit, filed Thursday in Fresno County superior court, that John-David Schofield breached his duties to the church. National church leaders removed Schofield as the head of the Fresno-based diocese after he led parishioners to align themselves with the conservative Province of the Southern Cone, an Argentina-based member of the worldwide Anglican Communion.

The head of the Russian Orthodox Church said Tuesday that Serbs must be able to live peacefully in Kosovo after its final status is determined, and hedecried the destruction of Orthodox churches in the province, which he said was carried out with tacit consent of the ethnic Albanian majority. Patriarch Alexy II said Kosovo was ''sacred'' for Serbs and offered his help in mediating the crisis in the region. In a speech and a question-and-answer session with parliamentarians from the council's 47 member states, Alexy also lamented widespread poverty and a massive gap between the rich and the poor in Russia, and -- in comments going directly against the spirit of the human rights watchdog -- lashed out against homosexuality, calling it an illness.