Russia: European Court of Human Rights rules ban on same-sex unions violates human rights
Reacting to the news that the European Court of Human Rights has ruled that Russia is in violation of the European Convention on Human Rights by not providing same-sex unions with the ability to gain legal recognition under domestic law, Natalia Zviagina, Amnesty International’s Moscow Office Director, said: “This landmark decision underlines that the Russian […]
Arrested, abused and accused: wave of repression targets LGBT+ Ghanaians
“All I wanted to do was help vulnerable people,” said Shaun Apong, tears streaking down his face, from behind the bars of a squalid police cell in Ho City in eastern Ghana. Apong was one of 21 people arrested in early June, charged with unlawful assembly, and accused of spreading an LGBT+ agenda, amid a […]
LGBTQ in China lament ‘dark day’ after social media crackdown
A week ago without warning, WeChat, a popular social media platform in China, permanently suspended the official accounts of more than a dozen college LGBTQ groups, igniting a new round of debate on the country’s already threatened community. The suspensions largely affected groups almost entirely run by students, including at prestigious academic institutions such as […]
Thai hospital opens one-stop center for LGBTQ services
BANGKOK — Thailand’s Bumrungrad International Hospital has launched a clinic for LGBTQ patients, bringing together specialized services catering to this minority demographic. The high-end private hospital operator’s new Pride Clinic will offer gender confirmation surgery, hormone treatments, cosmetic surgery and health checkups. These services had been scattered across multiple facilities. The clinic aims to tap […]
Taliban vow to crush gay men to death by pushing WALLS onto them as jihadis plunge Afghanistan back under Sharia law
THE Taliban have horrifically vowed to crush gay men to death by pushing walls on them as they plan to reinstate Sharia law across Afghanistan. Jihadist judge Gul Rahim, 38, offered an alarming insight into the future of the war-torn country if Islamic militants gain full control. They have already seized a third of Afghanistan […]
Murder of Samuel Luiz galvanizes Spain’s LGBTQ+ community: ‘There is no going back’
Just before Samuel Luiz was brutally beaten to death on July 3, he and his friend Lina made a video call to Vanessa González. The time was 2.45am and they were on the seaside promenade of A Coruña, a city in Spain’s northwestern region of Galicia. The friends told González that they were having a […]
Fresh protests in Spain over killing of gay man
MADRID (AFP) – People took to the streets of cities across Spain again on Sunday (July 11) to demand justice after a young gay man was beaten to death last weekend in a suspected homophobic attack. Crowds filled a central Madrid square and activists marched the streets of Almeria and the northern city of Coruna, […]
New Malaysian Anti-LGBT Law Proposal
On Friday 25 June, a task force within the Malaysian government proposed modifications to the laws governing social media. The new amendments would allow Malaysian officials to pursue legal action against users who insult Islam and “promote LGBT lifestyles.” The Sharia law was proposed in response to the increase in social media posts celebrating Pride […]
Pride Event in Israeli Settlement Draws Opposition From Multiple Directions
An LGBTQ Pride event in Ariel on Thursday marked one of the first such events in an Israeli settlement. The event was the initiative of 26-year-old Gal Hevroni, a gay former combat soldier now in his third year of civil engineering studies at Ariel University. Staging it was an uphill battle, though: Ariel, the fourth-largest […]
Hungary and Poland prime ministers with defiant rainbow protest
Rémy Bonny, an LGBT+ activist and the executive director of nonprofit organisation Forbidden Colours, shared images of the bold demonstration on Twitter Friday (9 July). The images show a variety of LGBT+ Pride flags entwined in a fence across from a busy road and walkway. Bonny explained: “Slovenian LGBTIQ organisations prepared a rainbow welcome to […]
Raffaella Carrà, Italian cultural institution and LGBT icon, laid to rest in Rome
In Italy’s week of mourning for Raffaella Carrà, one image summed up her universal appeal: a rainbow flag – the symbol of the LGBT movement – next to her coffin in a Catholic church. Carrà, who died on Monday aged 78, was a cultural institution in her home country, regarded as its “best-loved woman”. The […]
Israel’s Supreme Court rules in favour of same-sex couple surrogacy rights
Israel’s Supreme Court on Sunday ruled that current legal restrictions barring same-sex couples from becoming parents through surrogacy were unlawful and must be lifted within six months. The country’s LGBTQ+ community praised the decision as a breakthrough. It had demanded for years to be allowed to pursue surrogacy, which is already accessible to heterosexual couples […]
Georgian TV Cameraman Dies, Was Injured Amid Anti-LGBT Violence
A Georgian TV cameraman who was among dozens of journalists attacked by a right-wing mob during a melee aimed at LGBT campaigners has died. Co-workers of Lekso Lashkarava said on July 11 that he had died, apparently of injuries suffered during the violence six days earlier, but provided no further details. Lashkarava’s employer, Pirveli TV, […]
Chinese social media shutdown of LGBT student groups ‘highlights backlash against Western influences’
The closure of dozens of LGBT student organisations’ WeChat accounts this week may be the result of a larger Chinese nationalist backlash against perceived Western influences, according to cultural academics. “There is a tendency in China for some people to relate homosexuality and LGBT people to Western lifestyles or capitalistic, bourgeois decadence, so this was […]
Pakistan opens first state-run school for transgender people
Pakistan has opened its first government-funded school for transgender women, who are often bullied out of mainstream education as children in the deeply conservative nation. The country’s Khawaja Sira community date back hundreds of years and are treated as a third sex in South Asia. Many are ostracised by their families and shunned by society, […]
The podcast celebrating Singapore’s ‘hidden’ gay community
Through stories of personal experiences and interviews with guests, a groundbreaking podcast is trying to “celebrate and stop hiding” the LGBTQ+ community in Singapore, where sex between consenting male adults is still a crime. With a direct and engaging style, the three hosts of “The SG Boys” discuss everyday issues and bigger global problems while […]
Hungary Bans LGBTQ Content From Schools, But Some Teachers Say They Will Defy It
Viktoria Radvanyi says her job has never been so stressful. She’s on the board of Budapest Pride, Hungary’s annual LGBTQ event, whose monthlong festival is currently underway. “The clear effect of [Hungarian Prime Minister] Viktor Orban’s very, very homophobic and autocratic politics is that, year by year, we find it harder and harder to find […]
LGBTQ Activists Condemn the Dominican Republic For New Penal Code That Makes Anti-Gay Discrimination Legal
Recently, the hashtags #DontCometoDR and #DRisnotgayfriendly began to trend on social media. The trend was in response to a new penal code that the Dominican Republic‘s government passed. The Dominican Republic’s new penal code states that “sexual orientation” is no longer lawfully protected from discrimination. Article 186, section two of the country’s new penal code […]
China’s LGBTQ community is fading from rainbow to gray
During this year’s Pride Month, soccer star Li Ying made history as China’s first female athlete to come out publicly as gay, in a candid series of celebratory photos posted on social media, showing her posing happily alongside her partner. It’s increasingly common worldwide for celebrities and high-profile sports stars to come out, often to […]
Violence in the name of God
On July 5, Georgian far-right activists dispersed the planned Tbilisi Pride week by physically attacking more than 50 people, of which 53 were members of the local and international media. The anti-gay crowd also stormed the offices of Georgia’s LGBT rights organization and the civil movement Shame – all of which was done in the […]
The fight to save one of America’s last lesbian bars: ‘We’re like an endangered species’
There are only 21 lesbian bars remaining in the US – a vertiginous drop from 200 in the 1980s. The much-loved Cubbyhole is one of them. Everyone at the Cubbyhole has an origin story. Mona Williams was 21, queer, and had been kicked out by their family when they first arrived at the quaint little […]
Cannot Be Excused’: Thousands Rally In Georgia To Denounce Anti-LGBT Violence
TBILISI — Thousands have rallied in the Georgian capital to denounce violence against the LGBTQ community that shocked the nation and drew condemnation from Western embassies in the Caucasus nation. LGBTQ activists were forced to call off a pride march on July 5 in Tbilisi after opponents attacked activists and journalists and after the Georgian […]
LGBT visibility grows in Japan ahead of ‘diversity’ Olympics
Fumino Sugiyama, a former female fencer for the Japan women’s national team who came out as a man more than a decade ago, last week became the first transgender board member of the Japan Olympic Committee. Speaking with Nikkei Asia less than a month from the start of the “Unity in Diversity” Games, Sugiyama said […]
Hungary’s controversial anti-LGBT law goes into effect despite EU warnings
A new law that bans the dissemination of content in schools deemed to promote homosexuality and gender change went into effect Wednesday despite a warning from Europe’s top rights watchdog that the law risks discrimination against LGBT people. The new law that comes into force across Hungary prohibits sharing content on homosexuality or sex reassignment […]
European Court Upholds Russian Transgender Woman’s Right to Family Life
In a victory for a transgender parent’s right to maintain contact with her children, the European Court of Human Rights ruled on July 6 that Russia’s denial of her visitation violated her rights to family life and freedom from discrimination. The woman, known in court documents as A.M., had two children with her spouse before […]
LGBTQ Social Media Groups at Most Major Chinese Universities Shuttered Overnight
Tencent’s WeChat social media platform on Tuesday evening blocked and wiped all past content of the accounts for the campus LGBTQ groups of China’s top universities, striking a major blow against LGBTQ awareness and rights. Many campus LGBTQ clubs have never been officially recognized or condoned, but have been able to operate unofficially for years […]
Georgian LGBT Activists Call Off Pride March After Violent Attacks
LGBT campaigners in Georgia have canceled a planned Pride march after opponents attacked activists and journalists and the government and church spoke out against the event. Hundreds of violent counter-protesters took to the streets of Tbilisi against the Pride march scheduled for the evening. At least 15 journalists were attacked by mobs at different locations, […]
Russian retailer apologizes for lesbian couple in ad
MOSCOW, July 5 – A high-end Russian food retailer has angered both gay rights campaigners and opponents by running and then apologizing for an ad that included a profile of a family in which a mother and her adult daughter both have female partners. A 2013 Russian law, decried by Western countries as state-enforced bigotry, […]
Georgian Patriarchate condemns int’l support for ‘LGBTQ+ propaganda activities’ at Tbilisi Pride
The Georgian Patriarchate says the ‘drastic interference’ of foreign officials ‘in our public and spiritual life’ through supporting Tbilisi Pride events ‘is a matter of severe concern and [is] unacceptable’. Tbilisi Pride, a civic movement which opposes homo/transphobia and fights to overcome it through exercising the constitutional right of assembly and manifestation, is holding events […]
LGBTQ+: Bagbin’s neutrality soiled after becoming cheerleader for anti-LGBTQ bill
On the matter of the Speaker of Parliament, Alban Bagbin, welcoming a bill presented to the House that would criminalize the “promotion, advocacy, funding and act of homosexuality in all its forms,” a professor of law has described it as a failure on the part of the astute lawmaker. According to the Executive Director of […]