BURUNDI: AIDS activists condemn new anti-gay law
The Burundian Senate overwhelmingly voted against the draft bill in February, but in March the lower house of parliament reversed this decision, and President Pierre Nkurunziza signed it into law on 22 April.
“We regret that the law will hamper Burundi’s attempts to fight AIDS by further marginalizing an at-risk population,” said a statement by international rights groups, including the New York-based Human Rights Watch, local rights group Ligue Iteka and local AIDS NGO, Association Nationale de Soutien aux séropositifs et Malades du Sida (ANSS). “We urge the Government of Burundi to act promptly to decriminalize homosexual conduct.”
People found guilty of engaging in consensual same-sex relations risk imprisonment of two to three years and a fine of up to US$84. “Our activities will be hampered by this law,” said Georges Kanuma, chairman of the Association pour le Respect et les Droits des Homosexuels (ARDHO), a local gay rights movement.
“Our organization is now closing down its offices [in the capital, Bujumbura] because we are afraid that with the new law we may be arrested.” ARDHO has been in existence since 2003 but has never managed to gain legal recognition as an NGO.
The association distributes water-based lubricants and condoms, and raises awareness of HIV/AIDS among men who have sex with men. According to Kanuma, most Burundians are not even aware of the existence of men who have sex with men in their society.
“We are hoping to meet CNLS [Burundi's national AIDS control council] officials to see if they will also stop the activities they were planning for men who have sex with men,” he added.
In its latest national strategic plan, CNLS lists men who have sex with men among the groups vulnerable to HIV, and recognizes the need for targeted prevention activities in this community. MORE
| Published by |
 |
Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/04/burundi-aids-…
Burundi urged to repeal law criminalizing homosexuality
Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International [advocacy websites] and 60 other groups on Friday urged the Burundian government [joint statement text; press release] to repeal a new law criminalizing homosexuality [JURIST news archive] in the country. The law was promulgated by President Pierre Nkurunziza [BBC profile] on April 22, and subjects those found guilty of engaging in a homosexual relationship to a fine or up to two years in prison, or both. The groups said that the law violates the Burundi Constitution, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights [texts] and would harm anti-AIDS efforts in the country:
We consider the law to violate the rights to privacy and freedom from discrimination protected by Burundi’s Constitution and enshrined in its international treaty commitments, notably the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We deeply regret that the Burundian government has made a decision that writes human rights violations into law.
We regret that the law will hamper Burundi’s attempts to fight AIDS, by further marginalizing an at-risk population.
We respectfully remind the Government of Burundi that according to the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, arrests on the basis of sexual orientation are, by definition, human rights violations. We will carefully monitor any arrests made on the basis of this law.
The law was passed [JURIST report] by the country’s National Assembly in November despite being rejected by the Burundi Senate the previous February. See Burundi urged to repeal law criminalizing homosexuality
JURIST -* Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual
| Published by |
|
Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/04/burundi-urged…
Gay marriage advocate downplays opposition to issue
The Chicago based group that orchestrated the move toward gay marriage in Iowa says it will have observers in 25% of the county recorders’ offices Monday when same-sex couples can first seek licenses to marry — but the group is dismissing the idea there is any opposition to the marriages.
Camilla Taylor is the Lambda Legal attorney who led the Iowa lawsuit which resulted in the Iowa Supreme Court ruling that Iowa’s law saying marriage is between a man and a woman is unconstitutional.
Taylor was asked during a conference call with reporters Thursday if there was confusion among state officials over how they should handle gay marriage issues. Taylor says she hasn’t heard any particular difficulties in working out what the decision means. She says Iowa isn’t the first state to rule that marriage licenses must be issued to same-sex couples, so there is a lot of help available if Iowa officials have questions.
Lambda officials say Iowa has “embraced” the gay marriage ruling, and Taylor dismissed recent attempts in the legislature to bring up a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. Taylor says the state legislature “has made it very clear that the state legislature is not interested in putting discrimination into the constitution and that there are a lot of other issues that Iowans care about. She says there are budget issues and the state is recovering from natural disasters, “so I don’t think there is any will to amend the state constitution.”
Democratic leaders have blocked several attempts to bring up the vote on a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. Taylor was asked if her confidence would change if Republicans won back control or the legislature or if Iowa voters decided to call for a constitutional convention in 2010.
See Gay marriage advocate downplays opposition to issue
Radio Iowa – Des Moines,IA,USA
| Published by |
|
Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/04/gay-marriage-…
Gay Marriage: Is California’s Supreme Court Shifting?
The prospects of same-sex marriage in California grew dimmer Thursday, when two Supreme Court justices who helped create the right for gays to marry in last year’s historic decision expressed deep reservations about attempts to strike down a statewide referendum passed last fall to ban the practice. “You would have us choose between these two rights: the inalienable right to marry and the right of the people to change their constitution,” said Justice Joyce L. Kennard, one of those two key judges. “You ask us to willy-nilly disregard the right of the people to change the constitution of the state of California. But all political power is inherent in the people of California.” (See the top 10 ballot measures.)
The justices created the right to marry same-sex partners in California last year in a sweeping 4-3 decision. But in November, Californians went to the polls to amend the constitution to prohibit gay marriage. The amendment passed with 52% of the vote, but protests spread throughout the state in the days immediately after the vote. Several groups sued, arguing that stripping away the right to marriage amounted to such a serious change to the constitution that it should require more than a simple majority vote. (Read “A Brief History of Gay Marriage.”)
Chief Justice Ronald George, the Republican justice who authored last year’s opinion, appeared to agree that the barrier to constitutional amendments is far too low in California, noting that the Golden State has seen fit to amend its constitution no fewer than 500 times since 1911, while the U.S. Constitution has survived more than 200 years with just 27 amendments. But like Kennard, who had also voted with the majority to establish the right to gay marriage last year, George seemed to suggest Thursday that until the people of California raise the barrier for amendments, the court has little power to overturn their decisions.
See Gay Marriage: Is California’s Supreme Court Shifting? @ Time
| Published by |
|
Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/03/gay-marriage-…
Gay couples rally for marriage rights
(New York City) Thousands of same-sex couples nationwide are prepared to apply for marriage licenses on Thursday.
The attempts are being undertaken to protest court and voter decisions restricting legal matrimony to opposite-sex couples.
Activists geared up for rallies at marriage bureaus or county clerks’ offices in communities large and small – …
America’s top civil rights groups and legal scholars agree: Invalidate Prop 8
(San Francisco, CA, January 21, 2009) In the last round of an expedited briefing schedule, final briefs were filed today by both petitioners and respondents in the lawsuits challenging Proposition 8. The briefs filed today by the National Center for Lesbian Rights, Lambda Legal, and the ACLU responded to the more than 60 amicus curiae, or “friend of the court,” briefs filed in the case last week.
Those amicus briefs highlight the extraordinary breadth of support for Petitioners’ argument that Proposition 8 is invalid. The supporters represent the full gamut of California’s and the nation’s civil rights organizations and legal scholars, as well as California legislators, local governments, bar associations, business interests, labor unions, and religious groups.
In amicus briefs filed last Thursday, the nation’s leading legal scholars argued that Proposition 8 is invalid because it seeks to eliminate a fundamental right only for a targeted minority, which cannot be done through the initiative process. Professors from the most prominent universities and law schools in California and the country authored briefs urging the Court to invalidate Proposition 8, including scholars from Harvard University, Stanford University, Yale University, University of California (Berkeley, Los Angeles, Hastings, Davis, Irvine), University of Southern California, University of Pennsylvania, Rutgers University, University of San Francisco, Loyola Law School, Santa Clara Law School, Chapman University, and Pepperdine University.
A brief authored by Hastings Law Professor Donna Ryu and joined by 20 constitutional law experts, argued: “Proposition 8 represents the first time that the California initiative process has been wielded to abolish a fundamental freedom for an unpopular minority group and to alter the Constitution so as to mandate governmental discrimination against that group. In this way, Proposition 8 attempts to breach some of the most elemental textual and structural promises of our state Constitution. It revokes a fundamental right that, in the words of the Constitution, is “inalienable.” It dismantles constitutional equality for a single group of Californians – a group that, because of its history of oppression and stigma, is entitled to the highest level of constitutional protection against discrimination.”
Another brief authored by Professor Karl Manheim, one of the foremost authorities on California’s initiative process, stated: “Proposition 8 . . . improperly attempts to revise the Constitution by taking the unprecedented step of singling out a suspect class and depriving that class – and only that class – of a fundamental right.”
On January 15, 2009, 43 friend-of-the-court briefs urging the Court to invalidate Prop 8 were filed, arguing that Proposition 8 drastically alters the equal protection guarantee in California’s Constitution, and that the rights of a minority cannot be eliminated by a simple majority vote.
Other briefs supporting the legal challenge to Prop 8 were filed on behalf of 652 current and former California legislators; dozens of bar associations, legal aid organizations; and numerous California municipal governments.
In May of 2008, the California Supreme Court held that laws that treat people differently based on their sexual orientation violate the equal protection clause of the California Constitution and that same-sex couples have the same fundamental right to marry as other Californians. Proposition 8 eliminated this fundamental right only for same-sex couples. No other initiative has ever successfully changed the California Constitution to take away a right only from a targeted minority group. Proposition 8 passed by a bare 52 percent on November 4.
The National Center for Lesbian Rights, Lambda Legal, and the ACLU filed this challenge on November 5, representing Equality California, whose members include many same-sex couples who married between June 16 and November 4, 2008, and six same-sex couples who want to marry in California. The California Supreme Court has also agreed to hear two other challenges filed on the same day: one filed by the City and County of San Francisco (joined by Santa Clara County and the City of Los Angeles, and subsequently by Los Angeles County and other local governments); and another filed by a private attorney. These three cases are jointly under review by the California Supreme Court.
Serving as co-counsel on the case with NCLR, Lambda Legal, and the ACLU are the Law Office of David C. Codell, Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP, and Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP.
On November 19, 2008, the California Supreme Court granted review in the legal challenges to Proposition 8, and established an expedited briefing schedule, under which briefing was completed on January 21, 2009. The California Supreme Court has stated that it may schedule oral argument as early as March 2009.
The case is Strauss et al. v. Horton et al. (
S168047).
| Published by |
|
Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/01/americas-top-…
Religious group attempts to halt leather ‘play party’
A religious group that believes homosexuality is “evil” is trying to keep a leather S&M party from happening this weekend at Doubletree Hotel near Washington in Arlington, Va.
Americans for Truth About Homosexuality, a group “dedicated to exposing the homosexual activist agenda,” sent an action alert to its members today urging them to call the Doubletree and its owner Hilton to halt the event. Americans for Truth President Peter LaBarbera said a gay man forwarded his group an invitation to the event, supposedly hosted by a group called Fort Troff which dubbed it, according to Truth, a “pig sex” event called “MAL Maneuvers — for the purpose of pulling together hard-core pig players who want to fuck our brains out.”
LaBarbera told the Blade he’s trying to stop the event because in addition to his moral opposition to any gay activity, such an event in a hotel conference room is “illegal and a public health concern.” See Religious group attempts to halt leather ‘play party’ Southern Voice
| Published by |
|
Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/01/religious-gro…
Is California ready for 2010 vote on gay marriage?
Could California be voting on gay marriage again next year? Well, there is a new group, Yes! on Equality, that is beginning a campaign for the “2010 Marriage Equality Initiative.” It’s hard to say how serious this is, and whether voters really want to take this issue up again, but the website says organizers have learned their lesson from Prop. 8:
In addition to starting early, there are numerous factors that distinguish the Yes! Campaign. Perhaps the most paramount, is the inclusion of people. RollingStone, in a critical analysis of the No on 8 Campaign, noted that No on 8 failed to create a grassroots style organization and excluded LGBT community leaders. The Yes! Campaign recognizes this and has therefore built its foundation upon the inclusion of a diverse set of people. The purpose of this campaign is not to turn-away supporters, but rather to bring them together for a more effective outcome. Connecting with other minorities is an imperative part of this cohesion. The Yes! Campaign is continuing where other attempts left off by targeting all groups in our society.
Examiner.com reports signature gathering is coming.
See Is California ready for 2010 vote on gay marriage?
Los Angeles Times – CA,USA
| Published by |
|
Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/01/is-california…
Christian group loses subsidy for gay cure
Dutch Education Minister Ronald Plasterk says an orthodox Christian group will no longer receive a subsidy after allegedly attempting to cure homosexuality.
Plasterk said this week that the annual government subsidy provided to the Our Way foundation will be no more due to the Christian group’s suspected attempts to alter the sexual orientations of gay and lesbian individuals, Radio Netherlands/Expatica said Friday.
The Our Way group responded by claiming the religious organization does not support any other groups that target homosexuals and their sexual orientations.
See Christian group loses subsidy for gay cure
United Press International
| Published by |
|
Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/01/christian-gro…
