More than 60 countries continue to criminalize same-sex sexual acts despite advances in legislation over the past several decades, the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA) said Wednesday.
This organization, based in Geneva, remembered this wednesday that in six countries that are part of the United Nations (Brunei, Mauritania, Iran, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and Yemen), LGBTI persons still face the death penalty for their sexual status and homosexual acts are punishable in 64 countries.
In another five countries (Afghanistan, United Arab Emirates, Pakistan, Qatar and Somalia), the safety of these people is also not legally guaranteed, despite the fact that over the past 30 years, 49 UN member states have decriminalized consensual same-sex sexual acts.
ILGA also revealed that 51 UN countries still have rules that violate freedom of expression on issues of gender and sexual diversity.
In 11 of these areas, these laws regulate the treatment of the LGBTI issue in education and in another 25, the content conveyed by the ‘media’ is specifically regulated.
On the other hand, the association recognizes that sexual reorientation therapies are banned nationally in only 11 countries, while same-sex marriage is recognized in 33 UN member states and Taiwan.
The adoption of children by same-sex couples is only possible in about 30 United Nations countries.
Regarding the legal recognition of gender self-determination, only 20 states allow it on their territory, while the option to define yourself as a gender non-binary in official documents exists in another 20 UN countries.
This data is contained in the ILGA World Database — a database composed of 160 countries and territories — which contains up-to-date information on laws affecting LGBTI people around the world, divided into 18 categories and more than 100 topics.
“These data show how lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people continue to lag behind in many areas of life,” Luz Elena Aranda and Tuisina Ymania Brown, co-secretaries general of ILGA World, said in a statement.
Source: DN
