Militias target some Iraqis for being gay
“I’m not a terrorist,” he tells the Iraqi police who surround him. “I want you to know I am different. But I am not a terrorist.”
To some fundamentalist Iraqi Muslims, Ahmed Sadoun Saleh was worse than a terrorist.
He was gay. He wore his hair long and took female hormones to grow breasts. Amused by his appearance, Iraqi police officers stopped him in December at a checkpoint in a southern Baghdad neighborhood dominated by radical Shiite militias. They groped Saleh and ridiculed him.
The assault was captured on video and circulated on cellphones throughout Baghdad, says Ali Hili, founder of London-based Iraqi LGBT, a group dedicated to protecting Iraq’s gays and lesbians. Shortly after the video was made public, Hili says Saleh contacted him, fearing for his life, and asked for his help to flee Iraq.
“Unfortunately, it was too late,” Hili says. Saleh turned up dead two months later, he says.
At least 82 gay men have been killed in Iraq since December, according to Iraqi LGBT. The violence has raised questions about the Iraqi government’s ability to protect a diverse range of vulnerable minority groups that also includes Christians and Kurds, especially following the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Iraqi cities last month.
Mithal al-Alusi, a secular, liberal Sunni legislator, is among those who blame the killings on armed militant groups such as al-Qaeda and the Mahdi Army militia.
See Militias target some Iraqis for being gay
USA Today
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Married lesbian couple seeks protection in India
LUCKNOW: Even as the country debates pros and cons of legalising the same sex marriages and the Central government finds itself in a fix over the issue, a lesbian couple tied nuptial knot defying all social norms in Muzaffarnagar, known for honour killings and fundamentalist diktats by caste-based panchayats.
This is not all. Two days after the incident hit the headlines, the Muzaffarnagar district administration received another application for same sex marriage from another lesbian couple. While in the first case, officers have provided security to the newly wedded, they have not given permission to the second couple fearing a backlash from the community. Significantly, in both the cases, the couples belong to low income group and are not highly educated.
In the first case, Komal Sharma and Pinki Kashyap entered into wedlock and left their families to live together. The couple hails from Dayanand Nagar, a small locality in Shamli tehsil of Muzaffarnagar district. While Komal belongs to a Brahmin family and is educated till class XI, Pinki hails from an other backward class family and has studied only till class VIII. Komal’s father Rajendra Sharma is with home guard and Pinki’s father Hariram runs a small dairy.
The two girls met three months back in a vocational training centre where both had enrolled for a course in stitching. The friendship soon turned into love and they got secretly married through Arya Samaj rituals at a temple in Muzaffarnagar. They also to have entered wedlock legally through a court marriage in Delhi. While Pinki posed as the groom, Komal dressed as a bride.
The couple kept their marriage a secret till July 23, the day they left their families. According to police, Pinki came to Komal’s house in the morning of July 23 when Komal was alone with her two younger siblings. The duo gave sleeping pills mixed in cold drink to the Komal’s younger brother and sister and left the house. The two girls also filed an application in the office of Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP), Muzaffarnagar, complaining that they have threat to their lives from their families. See Married woman marries her ‘girlfriend’ in west UP Times of India
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Group: Gay bias killings highest since 1999
national advocacy group says the number of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people killed in bias-motivated incidents increased by 28 percent in 2008 compared to 2007.
The National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs released its report Tuesday. It says last year’s 29 killings is the highest it has recorded since 1999. It documented the same number of slayings then.
The New York-based coalition says the overall number of victims who reported anti-LGBT violence in 2008 increased by 2 percent.
The coalition says its figures are more accurate than those from law enforcement agencies. As an example, the group says the FBI doesn’t record bias crimes against transgender people because gender identity isn’t covered by federal hate-crime law.
See Group: Gay bias killings highest since 1999 Houston Chronicle
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AG Holder urges new hate crimes law
(Washington) Citing recent killings in Arkansas, Kansas and the nation’s capital, Attorney General Eric Holder on Tuesday said new hate crimes law were needed to stop what he called “violence masquerading as political activism.”
The attorney general’s call for Congress to act came as a civil rights coalition said there has …
Tags: Attorney General, Civil Rights Coalition, Congress, Eric Holder, Hate Crimes, Killings, Political Activism, ViolenceBush State Department Ignored Iraqi Gay Murders Gay City News
As concern over the killings of gay Iraqis grew in 2006 and 2007, the US Department of State appears to have done little more than develop media talking points and squabble over who at that agency should handle press interviews.
“[I]t is outrageous to see that by walking away from their responsibility to further investigate, document, and then ultimately discuss the human rights abuses with the Iraqi government, the US government missed a great opportunity to prevent the mass-scale attacks against LGBT community, which happened earlier this year in Iraq,” wrote Hossein Alizadeh, regional coordinator for Middle East and North Africa at the International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC), in an email.
Writing in Gay City News, Doug Ireland first broke the story in March of 2006 that Iraqi gays were being killed by death squads. Ireland and other gay press outlets continued covering the story in 2006 and into 2007, with the mainstream press offering occasional stories. The killings and the gay press reports on them have continued into 2009.
In September 2007 –– nearly two years ago –– Gay City News sent a Freedom of Information request to the State Department that sought all records “that relate to or identify homicides, assaults, or other violent acts committed against homosexual persons in Iraq.”
On May 26 of this year, the department responded, releasing two documents, totaling nine pages, that represent all the records that agency compiled from March 1, 2003, roughly the start of the Iraq War, through the date of the records request. No documents were withheld and only a small portion of the released documents was blacked out. See Bush State Department Ignored Iraqi Gay Murders
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Lebanese gays shun closet to fight for rights
(Beirut) In the Arab world, where several nations have seen killings of gay men in recent months, it can be startling to see a rainbow flag unfurled in public.
But the region’s only overt gay rights organization, based in Lebanon, says it is slowly making progress in preventing discrimination and violence.
Now …
Tags: Arab World, Beirut, Discrimination, gay men, Gay Rights Organization, Gays, Killings, Lebanon, Rainbow Flag, ViolenceIraqi ‘executioner’ defends killing of gay men
Abu Muslim likens his work to that of a surgeon, cutting out diseased parts of a body to save it from cancer. But unlike a doctor, he does not save lives, he takes them. Specifically, Abu Muslim and a small group of colleagues claim to have been killing homosexual men in Baghdad.
“We see this [homosexuality] as a serious illness in the community that has been spreading rapidly among the youth after it was brought in from the outside by American soldiers,” he said, in an interview in the Iraqi capital. Abu Muslim is not his real name. “These are not the habits of Iraq or our community and we must eliminate them.”
In recent months, dozens of gay Iraqi men are believed to have been murdered because of their sexuality, in a purge of those considered to be morally deviant, although such killings have been taking place since 2003. Officially the police put the number in the past two months at fewer than 10 killings, although unofficially they are reported to acknowledge the number is more than double that.
Some of the dead are likely to have been killed by family or tribe members who view the victim’s homosexuality as a stain on their collective pride. According to Abu Muslim, however, there has also been an organised campaign to exterminate homosexuals. He did not say how many men he and his group had killed, only that they had been involved in executing “some” and had permission from key community leaders in the Shaab area, in the north-east of the capital, where he has been operating.
None of the claims can be independently verified.
“We had approval from the main Iraqi tribes here to liquidate those [men] copying the ways of women,” he said, explaining that he had been in the Mahdi Army but was now working independently after the militia was disbanded by the leader of the Sadr movement, Muqtada al Sadr. “Our aim is not to destabilise the security situation. Our aim is to help stabilise society.”
Abu Muslim likens his work to that of a surgeon, cutting out diseased parts of a body to save it from cancer. But unlike a doctor, he does not save lives, he takes them. Specifically, Abu Muslim and a small group of colleagues claim to have been killing homosexual men in Baghdad.
“We see this [homosexuality] as a serious illness in the community that has been spreading rapidly among the youth after it was brought in from the outside by American soldiers,” he said, in an interview in the Iraqi capital. Abu Muslim is not his real name. “These are not the habits of Iraq or our community and we must eliminate them.”
In recent months, dozens of gay Iraqi men are believed to have been murdered because of their sexuality, in a purge of those considered to be morally deviant, although such killings have been taking place since 2003. Officially the police put the number in the past two months at fewer than 10 killings, although unofficially they are reported to acknowledge the number is more than double that.
Some of the dead are likely to have been killed by family or tribe members who view the victim’s homosexuality as a stain on their collective pride. According to Abu Muslim, however, there has also been an organised campaign to exterminate homosexuals. He did not say how many men he and his group had killed, only that they had been involved in executing “some” and had permission from key community leaders in the Shaab area, in the north-east of the capital, where he has been operating.
None of the claims can be independently verified.
“We had approval from the main Iraqi tribes here to liquidate those [men] copying the ways of women,” he said, explaining that he had been in the Mahdi Army but was now working independently after the militia was disbanded by the leader of the Sadr movement, Muqtada al Sadr. “Our aim is not to destabilise the security situation. Our aim is to help stabilise society.”
See Iraqi ‘executioner’ defends killing of gay men
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TV network reveals chilling new torture of Iraqi gays
Iraqi gay men reportedly are being tortured and killed by anti-gay Shiite militants who use a strong glue to seal their rectums and then give them a laxative-like drug, which results in a “painful and agonizing death,” according to this article. Video clips of the killings are being circulated via mobile phones, Yanar Mohammed, president of the Organization of Women’s Freedom in Iraq, said in an interview on the TV network Al-Arabiya. Gay City News (New York) * Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual
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‘They kill people like us,’ says gay Iraqi
BAGHDAD – Widespread violence is down across Baghdad, but not for one minority group.
Iraq’s gay population is being targeted by militia groups in a wave of killings that has claimed the lives of up to 25 young men and boys in the past month.
“They know I am gay. I don’t know if I am going to be killed, this is up to God,” said Moyad, a 38-year-old Baghdad resident who would not give his last name out of fear for his safety.
Visibly frightened, he said that he has many friends who have been sadistically tortured, some even murdered. “They are sticking glue up their anuses; some hospitals refuse to treat them. Is it a war waged against homosexuals?” he asked.
International outrage
Most of the attacks have happened in Baghdad’s Shia neighborhoods, and many believe that religious leaders have used Friday sermons in Sadr City as a platform to incite hatred and violence toward homosexuals. The bodies of three gay men were reported to have been found in Sadr City in April with pieces of paper bearing the word for “pervert” attached to them.
Posters and leaflets have been distributed in the Baghdad neighborhoods of al-Shola, al-Hurya and Sadr City with orders to, “Cleanse Iraq from the crime of homosexuality.”
Baghdad police didn’t respond to inquiries from NBC News about the attacks, but the surge in violence has gained attention by the international media.
‘They kill people like us,’ says gay Iraqi
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Gay bodies pile up in Baghdad
(Baghdad) The bodies of two gay men have been found in Baghdad’s Shiite slum of Sadr City after a leading cleric repeatedly condemned homosexuality, an Iraqi police official said Saturday.
The killings come after Shiite cleric Sattar al-Battat repeatedly condemned homosexuality during recent Friday prayers, saying Islam prohibits homosexuality. Homosexual acts …
Tags: Baghdad, gay men, Homosexual Acts, Iraqi Police, Islam, Killings, Police Official, Prayers, Sadr City, Shiite Cleric, Slum
