PARIS, June 1 (Reuters) – A same-sex couple who tried unsuccessfully to get married at seven different register offices in Ukraine suffered discrimination, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled on Thursday. The verdict, in a case brought to the court by plaintiffs Andrii Maimulakhin and Andrii Markiv in 2014, adds to calls for increased protection for and recognition of LGBTQ rights in the country, whose constitution still describes marriage as between a man and a woman. The couple’s “sexual orientation had been the sole basis for the difference in treatment,” the court said. “(Ukraine’s) broadly worded aim of the protection of the traditional family could not in itself be accepted as a valid ground for justifying the denial” of equal rights, it added. The court ruled that Ukraine, a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights, had violated articles on discrimination and the right to private and family life.