Inter Press Service - June 24, 2001
Marwaan Macan-Markar

The discrimination faced by gay men, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender people is so extensive and profound - ranging from social censure to torture and death - that the human rights group Amnesty International has termed it "an unacknowledged global shame."

A panel of independent UN experts is appealing to communities around the world to submit information to help it investigate sexual minority issues.

"The right to sexual preference should not be violated," says Hina Jilani, the UN secretary-general's special representative on human rights defenders. "We are concerned about the level of discrimination and persecution."

Jilani's colleagues on the panel include Nigel Rodley, the UN's special rapporteur on turture, and Radhika Coomaraswamy, the special rapporteur on violence against women.

Rodley plans to include information on "individual cases of torture and general allegations" against homosexuals and transsexuals in his next annual report to the UN Commission on Human Rights.

Similar patterns of abuse and discrimination on the basis of sexual identity are enshrined in social mores - and legitimised by law, policy and government practice - in countries as apparently unlike as Brazil, Syria and the United States, human rights monitors say.

Abuses range from torture, ill treatment, and sexual assault to forced medical or psychiatric treatment, according to Amnesty.

"The world over, lesbians, gay men, bisexual and transgender people are at particular risk of human rights violations because of their sexual identity," the London-based human rights watchdog says in a report, 'Torture based on sexual identity - an unacknowledged global shame.'

Police and prison officials are among the perpetrators of such abuses in the 30 countries Amnesty studied for its report. In Brazil, for instance, three transvestites were arrested in one town and taken to the police station where they were "brutally beaten with rubber sandals studded with nails and forced to clean filthy lavatories."

Amnesty also highlights "physical and psychological violence - often amounting to torture - in the community and even in the family." In Syria, it reports, a gay student was held back after school and raped by a teacher who told him he was a "sin to this world."

"The prevalence of sexism and homophobia in society means that lesbians are at particular risk of abuse, including being forced into marriage or sexual relationships with men," Amnesty adds.

Although such abuse is pervasive across continents and cultures, it is surrounded by "a conspiracy of silence" stemming from "generalised tolerance" of abuse against these victims and "fear of retaliation and reluctance by the victims to gain exposure," the group says.

Equally disturbing, notes Amnesty, are laws that condemn same-sex acts. "In over 70 countries same-sex relations are considered a crime, and in some instances they incur the death penalty."

According to another, US-based rights group, these "sodomy laws" have led to violence against homosexuals and transsexuals in Romania, India, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and elsewhere.

Laws "regulating sexual behaviour, social norms, or gender give a pretext for detention and for police brutality and inhuman treatment," according to the San Francisco-based International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC). The group blames governments for legitimising violence against sexual minorities.

"In many countries, governments either directly or indirectly permit violence against those who belong to a sexual minority," says Sydney Levy, IGLHRC's communications director. "Being a member of a sexual minority comes at a heavy price."

Many states, Levy adds, "hold the view that gays and lesbians do not need protection even if they are persecuted."

Even where laws appear less overtly hostile to sexual minorities, the group says, policies that contain discriminatory treatment based on sexual orientation or gender identity contribute to creating "a class of people whose existence may not be criminalised, but whose citizenship is clearly second-class."

Such discriminatory practices include the banishment of gays from orgnisations such as the Boy Scouts of America and the refusal to recognise same-sex marriages, resulting in the denial of health insurance and other benefits customarily offered to heterosexual couples.

Jilani, the UN special representative, says, "Human rights cannot be separated into different boxes, and the marginalisation of a people is a violation of minority groups. They have a right to be part of the mainstream."

T. Kumar, of Amnesty's US section, says governments cannot claim to uphold human rights if the rights of sexual minorities are denied. "As a first step, they should change the laws in the books that declare same-sex acts as a crime," he says.

Thereafter, governments should create an atmosphere for "public acceptance" of gay and lesbian rights, he argues, adding, "The rights of NGOs (non-governmental organisations) working on these issues have to be protected."

Kumar's appeal on behalf of NGOs is particularly timely. On Monday, the UN General Assembly begins a three-day special session on HIV-AIDS. Many grassroots groups - including those having nothing to do with sexual minorities - have complained of being marginalised or excluded from the event as well as the series of prior negotiations to hammer out a declaration for governments to adopt at the formal session. Reportedly, this has been done at the behest of delegates from the United States, Sudan, Syria, Pakistan, Malaysia, Egypt and the Philippines, among others.

Sexual minorities are at particularly high risk of contracting HIV- AIDS, according to UNAIDS, the joint agency spearheading the world body's response to the deadly epidemic. Yet, the IGLHRC is among groups that have been barred from the UN session's human rights roundtable. (END/IPS/WD/HD/HE/mmm/aa/01)
010624
IP010631

Copyright ©1990, 2000. ÆGIS. All materials appearing on ÆGIS are protected by copyright as a collective work or compilation under U.S. copyright and other laws and are the property of ÆGIS, or the party credited as the provider of the content. Feedback/Contact Us.