Dutch royals can marry person of same gender without giving up throne, says PM

The prime minister was responding to book arguing old laws would prevent same-sex marriage for a monarch or their heirs

A Dutch monarch can marry a person of whatever gender they choose without forfeiting their right to the throne, prime minister Mark Rutte has said.

Rutte was responding to questions from parliament that arose from a recent book, Amalia, Duty Calls, which argued that old laws would appear to exclude the possibility of a same-sex couple on the throne, despite same-sex marriage being legal in the Netherlands since 2001.