Tunis - The first ever film festival celebrating the LGBT community is underway in Tunisia, a Muslim country where homosexuals can face up to three years in prison.

Twelve short and medium-length films produced in Tunisia and across the Middle East and North Africa are being shown at the "Mawjoudin Queer Film Festival" that opened on Monday.

The four-day event is organised by Mawjoudin, Arabic for "We Exist", a Tunisian non-governmental association which defends the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.

It is the first event of its kind in Tunisia and the organisers say the "festival conceives of itself as audacious".

The films "speak of sexuality, identity and gender affiliation," said Senda Ben Jebara, a member of Mawjoudin, a group founded in 2014.

"Through this festival we would like to give a space to queer people in general in order to escape a bit from social pressure, and also to identify with something, find a means to express ourselves," she said.