Amnesty International has welcomed a Seoul court ruling from Tuesday that recognized spousal coverage under the state health insurance program for a same-sex couple.

Jang Bo-ram, the agency's East Asia researcher, said the latest ruling is an important step toward marriage equality in South Korea.

Jang said that although discrimination against, and the criminalization of, sexual minorities in South Korea is far from resolved, the judgment “offers hope that prejudice can be overcome.”

The researcher called for a comprehensive anti-discrimination law as well as the abolishment of a clause in the military criminal code that bans consensual sexual relations between two servicemembers of the same sex.

In a historic ruling on Tuesday, the Seoul High Court overturned a lower court's decision that defined marriage as a union between a man and a woman and cited a lack of legal grounds to expand spousal coverage of healthcare to same-sex couples.

In the ruling, the appeals court ensured same-sex unions cannot be recognized as a legal marriage, but judged that discriminating who is eligible for dependent status on a health insurance subscription runs counter to the principle of equality.