Uganda’s Constitutional Court on Monday took a first step toward hearing a challenge to an anti-gay law that rights activists and Western governments have denounced as draconian. The Anti-Homosexuality Act (AHA), signed into law by President Yoweri Museveni in May, is one of the world’s harshest anti-gay laws and punishes some same-sex acts with the death penalty. Lawyers in the case met before the court registrar and agreed to reconvene on Oct. 12, when the matter will be forwarded to the court’s judges to set a hearing date, Nicholas Opiyo, an attorney for the organisations contesting the law, told reporters.