HONG KONG — Hong Kong’s top court ruled on Thursday that a gay civil servant and his husband were entitled to spousal benefits and a joint tax return, the latest example of an Asian government expanding rights for same-sex couples.

The ruling by the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal found that the authorities had failed to justify an earlier decision to deny those benefits to Angus Leung Chun-kwong, an immigration officer in the semiautonomous Chinese territory, and his British husband Scott Adams, whom he married in New Zealand in 2014.

Though the ruling was limited in its scope and did not legalize same-sex marriage in the city, Mr. Leung’s supporters celebrated the decision as an incremental but important victory.

The court has made it “possible for all other current and future civil servants to enjoy the rights they should be entitled to,” Raymond Chan, an opposition member in the city’s Legislative Council who is Hong Kong’s first openly gay lawmaker, wrote in a Medium post after the ruling was announced.