HONG KONG -- Deutsche Presse-Agentur reports that a transsexual will ask Hong Kong's top court to affirm her right to marry her boyfriend, a news report said Saturday.

The lawyer of the 36-year-old, who was born a man, said the case would go to the Court of Final Appeal after a lower court on Friday refused her the right to legally marry a man.

The plaintiff, identified only as W, had a male-to-female sex change operation in 2008 and has successfully applied to change her name and gender on her identity card and school records.

But city marriage registration officials have since 2008 denied her the right to marry, a stance backed first by the High Court in 2010 and on Friday by the Appeal Court.

Lawyer Michael Vidler told the South China Morning Post that Hong Kong 'stands as an island' among places such as mainland China, Taiwan and Singapore where transsexuals can legally marry.

'W looks like a woman and acts like a woman,' he said. 'In all respects, other than the right to marry, she is treated as a woman.'