Russian president Vladimir Putin has attacked gay and trans rights in a fiery speech advocating for “traditional family values”.
Speaking at the Black Sea resort of Sochi, Putin said – apparently unironically – that teaching students about the existence of trans people is “on the verge of a crime against humanity”.
Stressing that Russia should stick to its own “spiritual values and historical traditions” and stay away from “sociocultural disturbances” in the West, Putin added that Westerners believe in “the aggressive deletion of whole pages of their own history, reverse discrimination against the majority in the interests of minorities”.
“It’s their right,” he added, according to the Washington Post, “but we are asking them to steer clear of our home. We have a different viewpoint.”
Russia has an abysmal record on its treatment of LGBT+ people, with anti-gay laws in the country contributing towards a hostile and dangerous environment for queer and trans Russians. Despite this, a vibrant queer underground thrives in Russia, with activists determined to create a better future for the Russian LGBT+ community.
Moreover, Putin himself has a long record of actual war crimes. According to Politico, these include “Russia’s criminal behaviour in Syria”, Putin’s history as an “agent of the Soviet secret police, a criminal institution” with a record of “mass killings”, his funding of pro-Russian terrorists in eastern Ukraine, and his involvement in the mysterious deaths of a series of Russian democrats, journalists and opposition leaders.
“The record speaks for itself: Putin is a killer and war criminal,” the Politicopiece says. “He must be treated as such by world leaders with even a minimal commitment to human rights and basic decency.”
In Vladimir Putin’s recent Sochi speech, he also said that trans rights activists are a threat to “basic things such as mother, father, family or gender differences”.
Earlier this month, a senior Russian government figure reportedly said that LGBT+ groups should be designated as “extremists“.
“The record speaks for itself: Putin is a killer and war criminal,” the Politicopiece says. “He must be treated as such by world leaders with even a minimal commitment to human rights and basic decency.”
In Vladimir Putin’s recent Sochi speech, he also said that trans rights activists are a threat to “basic things such as mother, father, family or gender differences”.
Earlier this month, a senior Russian government figure reportedly said that LGBT+ groups should be designated as “extremists“.
A Japanese transgender man, Gen Suzuki, 46, has filed a court request to have his legal gender recognized as male without undergoing sterilization surgery as prescribed by national law. His case highlights the urgent need for Japan to revise its outdated and harmful transgender legislation.
In Japan, transgender people who want to legally change their gender must appeal to a family court. Under the “Gender Identity Disorder (GID) Special Cases Act,” applicants must undergo a psychiatric evaluation and be surgically sterilized. They also must be single and without children younger than 20.
In 2017, during its Universal Periodic Review at the United Nations Human Rights Council, Japan pledged to revise the law. But despite mounting domestic and international pressure, the government has failed to do so. In 2019 Japan’s Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling that the law did not violate Japan’s constitution. However, two of the justices recognized the need for reform. “The suffering that [transgender people] face in terms of gender is also of concern to society that is supposed to embrace diversity in gender identity,” they wrote.
Momentum is growing domestically as well, as legal, medical, and academic professionals are speaking out against the law. In 2019 a transgender woman sued the Japanese government over a law that prevents her from having her legal gender officially changed from “male” to “female,” only because she has an 8-year-old child.
Even the name of Japan’s law reflects the need to reform it. Referring to “gender identity disorders” is fundamentally out of sync with international medical standards. The World Health Organization (WHO) removed “gender identity disorders” from its International Classification of Diseases in 2019, and governments have until January 2022 to update their diagnostic coding systems, meaning the phrase should no longer be on the books.
From Suzuki’s case to the WHO, to the growing voices of experts at home, the message is clear: Japan needs to change its regressive law now.
A Kuwaiti court has sentenced a transgender woman to prison for “imitating the opposite sex” online, Human Rights Watch said today. Such laws violate the rights to free expression, privacy, and nondiscrimination under Kuwait’s constitution and international law. The authorities should immediately release her and quash the conviction.
The court on October 3, 2021, sentenced Maha al-Mutairi, 40, to two years in prison and a fine of 1,000 Kuwaiti dinars (USD 3,315) for “misusing phone communication” by “imitating the opposite sex” online under article 70 of the telecommunication law and article 198 of the penal code. She has been arrested multiple times since 2019 for her transgender identity, but the current conviction is apparently based on her online activities in 2021.
“The Kuwaiti government’s monitoring, repeated arrests, and imprisonment of Maha al-Mutairi for her trans identity is a blatant violation of her basic rights,” said Rasha Younes, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Kuwaiti authorities should immediately reverse her conviction and allow her to live safely as a woman.”
Al-Mutairi told Human Rights Watch in a phone interview on October 8 that after receiving news of her conviction she went into hiding. But the police arrested her on October 11 at the hotel where she was staying. She is being held in Kuwait Central Prison, a men’s prison, in a solitary cell designated for transgender detainees.
Ibtissam al-Enezi, al-Mutairi’s lawyer, told Human Rights Watch that the court used al-Mutairi’s social media videos as evidence to convict her on grounds that she was wearing makeup, speaking about her transgender identity, allegedly making “sexual advances,” and criticizing the Kuwaiti government. Her appeals hearing is scheduled for October 31.
Al-Enezi said the prison officials have not mistreated al-Mutairi and that police had allowed her to call her lawyer. Al-Mutairi told Human Rights Watch that this was the sixth time she has been arrested due to her transgender identity and that before her current arrest she had been barred from traveling outside the country because of the cases against her.
On June 5, 2020, the authorities summoned al-Mutairi for “imitating women” – the fourth time she had faced the charge that year – after she posted a video online saying that the police had raped and beaten her while she was detained in a male prison for seven months in 2019 for “imitating the opposite sex.” The authorities released al-Mutairi on bail on June 8, 2020, without charge. She told Human Rights Watch that the police abused her during those three days in detention, including by spitting on her, verbally abusing her, and sexually assaulting her by taking turns touching her breasts.
A 2007 Kuwaiti law amended article 198 of the penal code, criminalizing “imitating the opposite sex.” Under article 70 of the telecommunication law, a person who “misuses” telephone communication may be imprisoned for up to a year and fined up to 2,000 Kuwaiti dinars (USD 7,091).
In 2012, Human Rights Watch documented the negative effects of article 198 on the lives of transgender women, who reported multiple forms of abuse at the hands of the police while in detention. They described degrading and humiliating treatment such as being forced to strip and parade around police stations, being forced to dance for officers, sexual humiliation, verbal taunts and intimidation, solitary confinement, and emotional and physical abuse that could amount to torture.
The Kuwaiti National Assembly should repeal the 2007 amendment to article 198, and Kuwaiti authorities should investigate all allegations of police brutality including sexual violence, hold officers accountable for misconduct, and protect transgender people from violence, Human Rights Watch said. Kuwaiti authorities should also amend article 70 of the telecommunication law to remove imprisonment as a punishment for speech violations that amount to defamation as defined by law.
Article 36 of Kuwait’s constitution guarantees freedom of opinion and expression. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which Kuwait has ratified, also guarantees the right to freedom of expression and requires that any restrictions “must be constructed with care,” ensure that they do not stifle freedom of expression in practice and should not provide for “excessively punitive measures and penalties.”
The United Nations Human Rights Committee, which monitors compliance with the ICCPR, has made clear that the covenant prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation in upholding any of the rights protected by the treaty. As a state party to the ICCPR and the Arab Charter on Human Rights, Kuwait is required to protect the rights to freedom of opinion and expression, including for transgender people.
“Al-Mutairi’s story is one of many horrific accounts by transgender Kuwaitis whose only crime is expressing themselves publicly,” Younes said. “Kuwait should immediately release al-Mutairi, investigate her allegations of sexual violence in detention, and end its criminalization and harassment of transgender people.”
Based on a 10-part investigative podcast by the Stephen Nolan programme released on Wednesday (13 October), its purported revelations are that Ofcom continues to submit information to the charity’s Workplace Equality Index program, despite having exited its Diversity Champions Scheme; and that the BBC’s Diversity and Inclusion department has worked closely with Stonewall, Europe’s largest LGBT+ charity.
It noted that a “senior figure in the [BBC] Diversity and Inclusion department described Stonewall as ‘the experts in workplace equality for LGBTQ+ people’”, with concerns allegedly raised “about Stonewall being regarded as ‘the’ experts, given the diversity of opinion among lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people over Stonewall’s policies”. A former BBC journalist was quoted as saying that she thinks some remaining employees “are frightened to speak out to say what they really think about Stonewall”; there is no mention of the BBC staff who, as reported by Vice recently, feel the BBC has become “hostile” for trans people and those who support trans rights.
The investigation has been viewed by many as just another attack on Stonewall, which is currently being targeted by the media and right-wing politicians in “an opportunistic hate campaign“, Scottish minister Patrick Harvie said this week.
Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner was among those who were critical of the BBC. “There is what appears to be a campaign in some parts of the media,” Rayner tweeted Friday, repeating her words from a recent speech. She shared a link to the BBC article. “The coverage of trans rights and trans issues is terrible… So I stand with Stonewall.”
Stonewall co-founder Lord Michael Cashman, an ex-MEP and former global envoy on LGBT+ rights for the British government, also backed the organisation he helped found on Twitter.
“Do I stand with an organisation, BBC News, that has a biased view against trans people and has informed current affairs staff they cannot attend marches like Pride or do I stand with Stonewall?” he asked.
“I Stand With Stonewall. Easy.”
Tash Oakes-Monger, LGBT health officer for NHS England, also tweeted their support for Stonewall, writing: “It shouldn’t be surprising that continuous public attacks against Stonewall, the largest LGBT+ rights organisation in Europe, correlate with increasing public attacks against LGBT+ people.”
Stonewall subject to unrelenting attacks
In recent years Stonewall has been subject to frequent attacks in right-wing media, with The Times and The Telegraph regularly platforming its critics. Some of the strongest criticism has come from The Times columnist Matthew Parris, one of Stonewall’s original founders, who renounced the charity in 2020 due to its trans-inclusive focus.
While many look to the BBC to provide an impartial counterpoint to such coverage, the judgement of its editorial team has been repeatedly called into question, most recently by a number of senior MPs and LGBT+ activists who claim BBC News is “institutionally transphobic”.
In an open letter published in June, the group of 150 raised “serious concerns” about a decision to “balance” an article about support for trans rights with a comment from feminist author Joan Smith, who has previously shared content by organisations labelled “transphobic hate groups”.
“You are treating the lives and existence of a significant minority not as a matter of dignity or human rights, but as a culture war within which your anti-trans journalists – and we are well aware that such exist at the BBC – are given free rein to take potshots at trans people,” the letter stated.
The BBC denied claims that its coverage is biased, with a spokesperson replying at the time: “Our reporting of the consultation of the Gender Recognition Act and JK Rowling’s transgender comments both contain opposing viewpoints, as would be expected in stories where there is a public debate. The BBC approaches every story with the same rigorous impartiality.”
The Stephen Nolan podcast and accompanying article are among the latest to critique Stonewall’s Diversity Champions scheme, an initiative described as “the leading employers’ programme for ensuring all LGBT+ staff are accepted without exception in the workplace”.
In March it was reported that the government’s Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) had withdrawn from the scheme, citing cost concerns. However, it was noted that the decision to cut ties came amid bitter clashes between Stonewall and the government commission over trans rights.
The news of the commission’s withdrawal from the scheme was reported days after Stonewall and several other LGBT+ groups delivered an open letter criticising the commission’s “deeply damaging” messaging on trans people, as well as its LGBT+ record as a whole.
Shortly after this several other government bodies, including the House of Commons and the Driver & Vehicle Licensing Agency, chose to follow the EHRC in withdrawing from the Stonewall scheme; in May Liz Truss recommended that all government departments do so as well.
The BBC is reportedly due to exit the scheme this month, according to Vice.
The report quoted an employee with 20 years experience at the BBC as saying: “I’ve never known a worse time to be LGBT+ at the BBC.
“There is deeply engrained institutional transphobia at the heart of the BBC, exacerbated by promotion of anti-LGBT+ views in the name of “balance”. I no longer feel safe as an LGBT+ person within the organisation.”
“There is deeply engrained institutional transphobia at the heart of the BBC, exacerbated by promotion of anti-LGBT+ views in the name of “balance”. I no longer feel safe as an LGBT+ person within the organisation.”
Stonewall’s work more vital than ever amid spiralling UK hate crime
Last week, Vice World News also reported that reports of transphobic hate crimes have quadrupled in the last six years, while reports of homophobic hate crimes have tripled in the same time period.
Stephen Doughty, a Welsh Labour MP, pointed out that the work Stonewall does is more vital than ever given the rise in anti-LGBT+ hate crimes.
<“I’ve proudly worked with Stonewall and Stonewall Cymru for years,” Doughty said. “They’ve had a hugely impactful + transformative impact for #LGBTQ+ people here (and globally).
“Not least when our lives + existence seem yet again to be up for ‘debate’, and hate crime on rise.”
Dr Michael Brady, the national government adviser on LGBT+ health, also made clear his support for LGBT+ charity Stonewall.
“I am forever in awe of the kindness, warmth, wisdom, all round excellence and absolute commitment to LGBT+ rights I see whenever I work with anyone from Stonewall,” Brady tweeted. “Thank you for all you do for our community #LGBTHealth.” >#IStandwithStonewall.”
Deborah Gold, chief executive at the National Aids Trust, who thanked Stonewall “for everything that you do” and tagged Nancy Kelley, Stonewall’s chief executive, saying “I am in awe of you and your colleagues”.
Adam Langleben, the national secretary for Jewish Labour, shared a link to the BBC article and said he found the “campaign against Stonewall” to be “quite frightening”.
The High Court of Namibia has granted citizenship to the son of a gay couple after a long, arduous fight.
Namibian Phillip Luhl and his Mexican husband, Guillermo Delgado, fought for years to have their son Yona Luhl-Delgado recognised as a legal Namibian citizen.
Yona was born via surrogacy in South Africa in 2019 but Namibian authorities initially refused to accept the birth certificate, insisting on a DNA test to prove a biological link to his father.
On Wednesday (13 October) High Court judge Thomas Masuku finally ruled that a paternity test is not needed to prove that Yona is their son, and that he is a Namibian citizen by descent.
“This is a big win for same-sex couples and especially a big win for Namibian children born outside Namibia by way of surrogacy,” the couple’s lawyer, Uno Katjipuka-Sibolile, told reporters after the judgement.
Luhl and Delgado’s battle isn’t over: they are still fighting to obtain Namibian citizenship for their twin daughters Maya and Paula, who were also born via South African surrogate in March.
The fathers had to fight just to bring the babies home, as Namibian authorities refused to issue emergency travel documents for the girls. Eventually the government relented in May and issued papers that allowed them to enter Namibia, but not leave.
“It’s quite sad that it takes so much emotional, financial disruption to our lives in order to get a simple bureaucratic decision taken that allows us to be together as a family,” Luhl said at the time.
Nevertheless, the couple’s latest victory in the courts is significant as it was seen as a test case for Namibia, where homosexuality is criminalised and foreign same-sex marriages are not yet recognised.
“Today is a good day to be Namibian; today is a good day to be a young, queer Namibian; today is a good day to be a born free Namibian,” said Omar van Reenen of the Namibia Equal Rights Movement.
“This is what the liberators fought for – for a republic that no longer holds people chained to the shackles of discrimination, of state-sanctioned homophobia.”
An 18-year-old man in Jamaica remains hospitalized in critical condition after he was targeted on a gay dating app.
The Jamaica Gleaner reports the victim on Oct. 11 went to a neighborhood in Montego Bay, a resort city that is the capital of Jamaica’s St. James Parish, to meet the man with whom he was speaking.
The newspaper reports the man and two other men abducted the victim, robbed him and partially severed his penis before they set him on fire. Officials said the three men took his cell phone and used his bank card to withdraw money from his account.
“He is a very lucky young man because although they left him in a critical condition, he managed to make his way to a security checkpoint in the community where they assisted him to the hospital, where he was admitted in critical condition,” a local police officer told the Jamaica Gleaner.
The Jamaica Gleaner reported a 43-year-old man in St. James Parish disappeared in January 2020 after he went to meet someone with whom he had spoken on a gay dating website. Authorities later found the man’s body, and two men have been charged with his murder.
Violence against LGBTQ Jamaicans remains commonplace. Consensual same-sex sexual relations also remain criminalized in the country.
J-FLAG, a Jamaican LGBTQ rights group, has condemned the latest attack.
“Like all well-thinking Jamaicans at this time, JFLAG is outraged at the recent attack on an 18-year-old man in St. James,” tweeted J-FLAG on Sunday. “His attackers must be brought to justice.”
Kabul was known as one of the few “liberal” cities in Afghanistan. The word liberal is in quotation marks, and inflected, because it is liberal compared to the rest of the country. Now that the Taliban has taken over, most people who expressed themselves differently and openly are forced to adhere to Sharia law, completely change their ways, hide their identity, or be killed.
The U.S. State Department reported in 2020 that even before the Taliban took power in August, LGBTQ people in Afghanistan faced “discrimination, assault and rape” and “homosexuality was widely seen as taboo and indecent.” Laws against lesbian, gay and transgender people made their existence illegal and punishable by up to two years in jail. Those laws were not always enforced, but they did leave LGBTQ people at risk of extortion and abuse by authorities, as reported by the U.K. government.
Even with the discrimination and abuse, LGBTQ people still had a sliver of space in society. Nemat Sadat, an LGBTQ Afghan author living in the United States said that gay, lesbian and transgender people helped the country’s cultural life develop since the Taliban’s last rule 20 years ago. But, most of these people built their lives quietly.
Now with the Taliban regime, their sliver of space in society is gone, there is no room to live quietly as an openly LGBTQ person. Under the Taliban’s interpretation of Sharia law, homosexuality is punished by death.
In an interview with Reuters, Waheedullah Hashimi, a top decision maker for the Taliban said, “there will be no democratic system at all because it does not have a base in our country,” and continued to say, “what type of political system should we apply in Afghanistan is clear. It is sharia law and that is it.”
One source spoke to a 20-year-old university student who is lesbian in Afghanistan. Her family accepted her as a lesbian, but now the new Taliban leadership has put the lives of all of her family at risk. There is a new surge of violence against any lesbian, gay and transgender people. This includes anyone speculated of being lesbian, gay, or trans, and those who support them.
This young lesbian woman has gone into hiding. She is part of hundreds of LGBTQ people in Afghanistan who are pleading with advocates and organizations outside Afghanistan for help to escape the Taliban tyranny.
Nemat Sadat shares stories of lesbian, gay and trans people in hiding. He shared a story of a gay man who watched from his hiding place in the ceiling as Taliban fighters beat the friend who refused to disclose his location.
LGBTQ people in Afghanistan fear the risk of being arrested, beaten and killed. The Taliban made it clear that it is enforcing its strict religious laws against Afghanistan’s LGBTQ citizens. In an interview with Germany’s Bild newspaper, one Taliban judge said there were only two punishments for homosexuality: “stoning or being crushed under a wall.”
LGBTQ people in Afghanistan are reporting that their friends, partners and members of their community are being attacked and raped. They also stated that Islamic fundamentalists and riotous groups are encouraged by the new tyranny and are on the hunt for LGBTQ people.
Another source shared that a gay man was targeted for his sexuality and then raped by his male attackers. That is a terrible paradox. He was raped by his male attackers, who criminalizing him for having same sex relations.
LGBTQ people are in hiding, desperately trying to get out of the country, and trying to erase any proof of their queer identity.
They feel abandoned by the international LGBTQ community. The Taliban is proving that the Western nations have normalized relations to their government. The Taliban and their supporters see this a proof of their victory. This leaves LGBTQ people defeated and fearing torture and death.
The U.S. government and other Western countries evacuated many people out of Afghanistan, including journalists, women’s rights activists and those who worked with foreigners. But, LGBTQ activists said that nothing has been done for them. A source says about her situation, “we will definitely be killed. We are asking to be evacuated immediately from Afghanistan.” To date, no safe route has been found.
Even underground measures to help LGBTQ people are challenging and near impossible. The Rainbow Railroad is a non-governmental organization helping LGBTQ people around the world escape persecution. Executive Director Kimahli Powell said evacuating LGBTQ people from Afghanistan is especially hard as they are often alone, in hiding, and unable to contact each other. If routes to get them out is nearly impossible, that still means those routes are somewhat possible. As difficult as it may be, we must find pathways to save these people and get them out.
The Taliban regime has established itself, knowing with certainty that the world will stand aside, albeit condemning and protesting, but not intervening. This is empowering jihadists across the world, especially in the Middle East. The Taliban has many allies and admirers, including the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and Hamas.
The leader of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, travelled from Palestinian territories to meet with Taliban leaders in Qatar. The Palestinian Islamic Jihad has a history of ties to the Taliban, even with radicals joining each other’s organizations. Very public statements of congratulations were made between leaders of the Taliban, Hamas, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and all with full Iranian support.
The increase in brazen forcefulness of these groups reaches beyond Afghanistan, and spreads to the lands dominated by other similar groups. This causes an escalation of the threats to anyone who opposes Sharia law or who lives differently than what Sharia law allows. LGBTQ people in these lands are in peril.
If we do not help LGBTQ people in Afghanistan, the lives of LGBTQ people under other similar tyrannies face increased uncertainty and danger.
The U.S. on Thursday regained a seat on the U.N. Human Rights Council, three years after the previous administration withdrew from it.
The U.S. won election to the council alongside Argentina, Benin, Cameroon, Eritrea, Finland, Gambia, Honduras, India, Kazakhstan, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Montenegro, Paraguay, Qatar, Somalia and United Arab Emirates.
The council in recent years has emerged as a champion of LGBTQ rights around the world, even though Cuba and other countries with poor human rights records are among the 47 countries that are currently members. Venezuela and Russia are also on the council.
Russia’s crackdown on LGBTQ rights and the Kremlin’s close relationship with Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov continue to spark criticism around the world.
Then-U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley during a 2018 press conference that announced the U.S. withdrawal from the council noted Cuba and other countries “with unambiguous and abhorrent human rights record” are members. Haley also said the council has a “chronic bias against” Israel.
U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield on Thursday in a statement said LGBTQ rights will be one of the U.S.’s focuses once it officially rejoins the council on Jan. 1.
“Our initial efforts as full members in the Council will focus on what we can accomplish in situations of dire need, such as in Afghanistan, Burma, China, Ethiopia, Syria and Yemen,” she said. “More broadly, we will promote respect for fundamental freedoms and women’s rights, and oppose religious intolerance, racial and ethnic injustices, and violence and discrimination against members of minority groups, including LGBTQI+ persons and persons with disabilities. And we will oppose the council’s disproportionate attention on Israel, which includes the council’s only standing agenda item targeting a single country.”
President Biden in February issued a memorandum that commits the U.S. to promoting LGBTQ rights abroad.
The previous White House tapped then-U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell to lead a campaign that encouraged countries to decriminalize consensual same-sex sexual relations, but many LGBTQ activists in the U.S. and around the world have questioned its effectiveness. The Washington Blade in August filed a federal lawsuit against the State Department that seeks Grenell’s emails around his work on the decriminalization initiative.
“The President and Sec. Blinken have put democracy and human rights—essential cornerstones of peace and stability—at the center of our foreign policy,” said State Department spokesperson Ned Price on Thursday after the U.S. regained a seat on the council. “We have eagerly and earnestly pursued these values in our relationships around the world.”
“We will use our position to renew the council’s focus on the core human rights principles enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the U.N. Charter, which undergird the council’s founding,” added Price at the beginning of his daily press briefing. “Our goal is to hold the U.N. Human Rights Council accountable to the highest aspirations of its mandate and spur the actions necessary to carry them out.”
India’s National Medical Commission has ordered publishers and medical schools to edit their textbooks and curricula to exclude discriminatory and unscientific portrayals of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) people.
The order from the country’s highest medical regulator follows a June 2021 Madras High Court rulinginstructing institutions across the country to roll back prejudicial and inaccurate portrayals of sexual and gender minorities. In the judgment, Judge Anand Venkatesh said, “Ignorance is no justification for normalizing any form of discrimination.” His language echoes previous court rulings and commission reports in India.
In 2018, when the Supreme Court unanimously struck down India’s colonial-era criminal prohibition on same-sex relations, Justice Indu Malhotra stated that, “an apology [is owed] to members of the LGBT community … for the ostracization and persecution they faced because of society’s ignorance.” In the case’s early stages, the Indian Medical Association made clear: “We are seriously concerned that homosexuality is looked upon as a disorder and in our joint petition appealed to the Supreme Court that it was not an illness.”
In January 2021, the Delhi Child Rights Commission recommended a ban on medically unnecessary “normalizing” surgeries on children born with intersex variations. This follows the southern state of Tamil Nadu banning such operations in 2019 after a court upheld the informed consent rights for intersex children. The commission’s recommendation received support from the Delhi Medical Council, which wrote that, “[s]urgical interventions … that are not deemed medically necessary should be delayed until the patient can provide meaningful informed consent.”
Welcoming the medical commission’s advisory this week, Dr. L. Ramakrishnan, vice president of SAATHII, an LGBT advocacy group, said: “The issue is not only one of misrepresentation but also one of absence. For instance, standard Indian textbooks in Pediatrics do not mention same-gender attraction or transgender identity in a non-pathologizing manner while addressing child and adolescent development.”
The National Medical Commission’s announcement further indicates the widespread support for reform among Indian legal and medical experts. It is a good precedent for what is needed across the education sector – a comprehensive update of outdated curricula.
Edgar García and his partner, Dannys Torres, on Oct. 3, 2018, used a canoe to cross the Arauca River that marks the Venezuela-Colombia border.
García was a member of the board of directors of Alianza Lambda de Venezuela, a Venezuelan LGBTQ rights group, before he fled Venezuela. Torres worked as a hairdresser in Caracas, the Venezuelan capital.
The couple now lives in Rafael Uribe Uribe, a working-class neighborhood in Bogotá, the Colombian capital.
Torres continues to work as a hairdresser. García most recently worked for a telecommunications company.
“We are settled here in Bogotá,” García told the Washington Blade on Sept. 21 during an interview with him and Torres that took place at a shopping mall near their home. “You have your life here.”
García and Torres are two of the more than 5.4 million Venezuelans who the Coordination Platform for Migrants and Refugees from Venezuela say have left their country as of November 2020 because of its ongoing economic and political crises.
Statistics from the Colombian government indicate there are currently more than 1.7 million Venezuelans in the country. More than 50 percent of them live in Bogotá and the departments of Norte de Santander, Atlántico and Antioquia.
Colombian President Iván Duque in February announced the country would legally recognize Venezuelan migrants who are registered with the government.
Sources in Colombia with whom the Blade has spoken say there are likely many more Venezuelan migrants in the country than official statistics indicate. Venezuelan migrants who are LGBTQ and/or living with HIV remain disproportionately vulnerable to discrimination and violence and often lack access to health care and formal employment.
A report the Red de Movilidad Humana LGBTI+—a network of advocacy groups in Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Brazil, Argentina, Guatemala and Mexico—published with the support of the U.N. Refugee Agency notes sex trafficking and even death are among the myriad threats that LGBTQ migrants from Venezuela face once they enter Colombia. The report indicates they also face discrimination in shelters because of their sexual orientation and gender identity, sexual violence and a lack of access to the Colombian judicial system.
Trans woman left Venezuela ‘in search of a better quality of life’
Vanesa, a 25-year-old transgender woman from the Venezuelan city of Maracaibo, came to Colombia eight years ago “in search of a better quality of life.”
She told the Blade on Sept. 14 during an interview at Fundación de Atención Inclusiva, Social y Humana (FUVADIS)—an organization in Barranquilla, a city in Atlántico department that is near the mouth of the Magdalena River in northern Colombia, that serves Venezuelan migrants—she entered Colombia near Maicao, a city in La Guajira department via an informal border crossing known as a “trocha.” Vanesa said she was nearly kidnapped.
“The people who were standing on the sides (of the “trocha”) who ask you for money were supposedly security,” she said. “There was no security. They left me there because I was trans. They said a lot of ugly things. They assaulted me, including one (man) who was not going to let me go. They wanted me to kidnap me or have me there to do whatever they wanted to me.”
Vanesa said a woman helped her escape.
“The experience was horrible,” she said.
Vanesa traveled to Cartagena, a popular tourist destination that is less than two hours southwest of Barranquilla, and began to work at her friend’s hair salon. Vanesa told the Blade that her friend’s mother “never liked me because … she is a Christian.”
Vanesa now lives in Barranquilla and supports herself through video chats. Vanesa also competes in local beauty pageants and is able to send money to her mother in Venezuela.
“I work here,” she said. “I am relatively well off.”
Andy, a trans man from Venezuela’s Maracay state, left Venezuela four years ago with his partner and their daughter. Andy, like Vanesa, entered Colombia via a “trocha” near Maicao.
“I migrated because the situation was becoming worse and worse each day,” Andy told the Blade on Sept. 14 as he attended a workshop that Caribe Afirmativo, an LGBTQ group in northern Colombia, organized at a Barranquilla hotel.
Caribe Afirmativo has opened three “Casas Afirmativos” in Barranquilla, Maicao and Medellín that provide access to health care and other services to Venezuelan migrants who are LGBTQ and/or living with HIV/AIDS. Caribe Afirmativo also operates several “Casas de Paz” throughout northern Colombia that support the implementation of an LGBTQ-inclusive peace agreement between the government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia that came into force in 2016.
Andy said his work in Venezuela allowed him to learn how “to sell whatever product,” but he told the Blade he struggled to find a job once he arrived in Colombia.
Andy told the Blade that he, his partner and their daughter now have stable housing in Barranquilla. Andy said he also has received a job offer in Medellín, the country’s second-largest city that is the capital of Antioquia department.
Jesús Gómez is a 33-year-old gay man from Venezuela’s Trujillo state in the Venezuelan Andes that are close to the country’s border with Colombia.
He previously worked with Venezuela Diversa, a Venezuelan LGBTQ advocacy group, and accepted a position with the municipality of Chacao that is part of Caracas. Gómez, whose mother was born in Colombia, also joined a student protest movement against the government.
Gómez fled to Colombia and is pursuing his asylum case with the help of UNHCR.
“I feel bad emotionally, but I am well-off compared to other people,” he told the Blade on Sept. 16 during an interview at a hotel in Cúcuta, a city in Norte de Santander department that is a few miles from the country’s border with Venezuela. “I am working to help other people who are in the same situation.”
Gómez in December is scheduled to graduate from nursing school. He also works with Fundación Censurados, a Cúcuta-based HIV/AIDS service organization that works with Venezuelan migrants, and has supported other organizations in the area that serve them.
FUVADIS Executive Director Luis Meneses, like Gómez, was an LGBTQ activist in Venezuela.
Meneses, who is from Venezuela’s Zulia state, in 2010 unsuccessfully ran for Venezuela’s National Assembly. Meneses in February 2018 fled to Colombia because of the “political persecution” he said he suffered.
“Discrimination and prejudice against me began when I came out to defend LGBTI rights,” Meneses told the Blade on Sept. 14 during an interview at his office.
Meneses in August 2018 launched FUVADIS, which receives support from groups that includes UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration. FUVADIS provides health care, antiretroviral drugs and a host of other services to Venezuelan migrants with HIV/AIDS and other populations that include sex workers. Vanessa and nearly 900 other FUVADIS clients are LGBTQ.
“We cannot work for the migrant population by only giving them humanitarian assistance,” said Meneses. “It’s also about guaranteeing access to their rights.”
Venezuelans with HIV/AIDS die because of lack of medications
The New York-based Aid for AIDS International estimates more than 10,000 Venezuelans with HIV have left the country in recent years. Activists and health care service providers in Venezuela with whom the Blade has spoken in recent years have said people with HIV/AIDS in the country have died because of a lack of antiretroviral drugs.
The Venezuelan government has also targeted HIV/AIDS service organizations.
Members of Venezuela’s General Directorate of Military Counterintelligence in January raided the offices of Azul Positivo, an HIV/AIDS service organization and arrested President Johan León Reyes and five other staff members. Venezuelan police on Feb. 15, 2019, raided the offices of Fundación Mavid, another HIV/AIDS service organization in Valencia, a city in Carabobo state, and arrested three staffers after they confiscated donated infant formula and medications for people with HIV/AIDS
Deyvi Galvis Vásquez, a doctor who is the manager of prevention and testing for AIDS Healthcare Foundation Colombia on Sept. 17 during an interview at AHF’s Cúcuta clinic showed the Blade pictures of Venezuelans with HIV/AIDS in Colombia who had cases of Kaposi’s sarcoma.
“The conditions are of extreme vulnerability,” said Galvis.
Andrés Cardona, director of Fundación Ancla, a Medellín-based group that works with migrants and other vulnerable groups, during a Sept. 13 interview with the Blade in his office echoed Galvis. Cardona added stigma specifically against Venezuelans with HIV/AIDS is one of the myriad issues he and his colleagues confront.
“The issue of the elimination of HIV also implies not only an issue of communication and prevention, but also an issue of effective attention,” said Cardona. “We have our conservative culture, an idea that the Venezuelans who are coming are going to give us HIV.”
“This is totally discriminatory,” he added.
Cardona, like those inside Venezuela with whom the Blade has spoken, said there are no services in the country for people with HIV/AIDS.
“There are many Venezuelan migrants with HIV who enter Colombia, because they are going to die if they don’t,” he said.
AHF operates clinics throughout Colombia
AHF operates other facilities in Bogotá and in the cities of Bucaramanga, Yopal, Valledupar and Ríohacha. The organization, along with the Colombian Red Cross and the government of Santander department, in March began to distribute condoms, food and water and offer rapid HIV tests to Venezuelan migrants who travel through Páramo de Berlín, a high plateau in the Colombian Andes through which a highway between Cúcuta and Bucaramanga passes.
AHF, among other things, offers migrants rapid HIV and syphilis tests and counseling for people who test positive. AHF also provides lab tests, formula for children of mothers with HIV and health care with an “interdisciplinary health care team.”
AHF Colombia Country Program Manager Liliana Andrade Forero and AHF Colombia Data Manager Sandra Avila Mira on Sept. 20 noted to the Blade during an interview at AHF’s Bogotá clinic that upwards of 2,000 migrants currently receive care from the organization. They also pointed out that 1,952 of them are taking antiretroviral drugs the Brazilian government donates.
Galvis noted to the Blade that many of AHF’s patients also have access to mental health care and social workers.
“AHF’s policy is to reach out to everyone,” he said.https://www.youtube.com/embed/yJBrbPEkilw?feature=oembed
Pandemic has made migrants even more vulnerable
Galvis, Fundación Censurados Director Juan Carlos Archila and other Colombian HIV/AIDS service providers with whom the Blade spoke say the pandemic has made Venezuelan migrants with HIV/AIDS in the country even more vulnerable.
Lockdowns prevented sex workers and others who work in the informal economy from earning money. A “pico y género” rule implemented by Bogotá Mayor Claudia López that allowed women to leave their homes on even days and men to leave their homes on odd days sparked criticism among trans activists.
Archila, who is a nurse, on Sept. 16 told the Blade during an interview at a Cúcuta hotel the pandemic has also left Censurados in a precarious situation.
“We endured practically two years with the doors closed, with expenses increasing,” he said. “The need of people who come to us for the issue of HIV remains, and yet we are all trying to cope with the situation.”
Andrade noted AHF’s Bogotá was closed for several months at the beginning of the pandemic because of the city’s strict lockdown.
The pandemic also forced FUVADIS to close its offices in March 2020, but Meneses told the Blade the organization was able to see a handful of patients at a time. He said “basic humanitarian assistance” that included hygiene kits and food were among the things that FUVADIS was able to provide its patients during the pandemic.
“Understanding how the situation for the LGBTI community, people with HIV, the migrant population and the refugee population is, we could not allow (our services) to shut down,” Meneses told the Blade.