New Delhi: The United States of America has issued the first American passport with an "X" gender marker.
The State Department said the objective is to give non-binary, intersex and gender-nonconforming people a gender marker other than male or female on their travel document, Reuters reported.
India already offers a third gender on documents, as do Canada, Germany and Australia.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken had announced in June that the X marker would be offered as an option on American passports.
In a statement, State Department spokesperson Ned Price said the US is adding the "X" gender marker as an option for those applying for passports or Consular Reports of Birth Abroad.
The First Recipient
While Price did not identify the person holding the first "X" gender passport, Reuters reported that civil rights organisation Lambda Legal said its client Dana Zzyym, a US Navy veteran, is the recipient.
"I almost burst into tears when I opened the envelope, pulled out my new passport, and saw the 'X' stamped boldly under 'sex'," the Reuters report quoted the intersex and nonbinary person has having said in a statement.
"It took six years, but to have an accurate passport, one that doesn’t force me to identify as male or female but recognizes I am neither, is liberating."
Zzyym uses gender-neutral pronouns "they," "them" and "their".
According to Lambda Legal, Zzyym was born with ambiguous sex characteristics, and had to undergo several "irreversible, painful, and medically unnecessary surgeries" because their parents decided to raise them as a boy.