Famed sexologist Mariela Castro, daughter of the Cuban President, said she expected her country this year will pass a same-sex marriage law, although she said Cuba still needs to be more revolutionary in its treatment of gays.

Mariela Castro said she hoped that this year Parliament would pass legislation to legalise gay marriage in Cuba.

But the Bill under debate by lawmakers was not everything that “we would have hoped for.”

She made her remarks a day after President Barack Obama said he supports gay marriage.

Ms Castro looked to another of its neighbours, Argentina, as the model after which she would have liked to pattern Cuba’s gay rights agenda.

She praised the fact that Buenos Aires legalised gay marriage back in 2010, as well as the passage by the Argentine Senate of a “sexual identity” Bill allowing transvestites and transgendered people to choose how their sex is reported on official documents.

The daughter of President Raul Castro and the niece of former President Fidel Castro, Ms Castro runs Cuba’s National Centre for Sex Education (Cenesex).

She praised Cuba’s Communist Party Congress held in January for having resolved “to fight against all forms of discrimination, including against sexual discrimination, and discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and sexual identity”.

“It’s a hugely important first step,”she said.

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