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Uganda chosen to host Africa's biggest HIV conference amid LGBT crackdown

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By Andrew Green 

BERLIN — In her plenary address at the International Conference on AIDS and STIs in Africa this month, Cindy Kelemi, executive director of the Botswana Network on Ethics, Law, and HIV/AIDS, called attention to missing political leadership in the HIV response.

"In our beloved Africa, there are many countries with anti-LGBTI policies and laws," she told the audience in Kigali, Rwanda. "We need political leadership to remove political and structural barriers."

The very next day, ICASA officials announced that Uganda — a country that has recently renewed a crackdown on its LGBT community — would host its 2021 conference, the largest gathering related to HIV/AIDS on Africa’s calendar.

In sub-Saharan Africa, there remains a high rate of HIV transmission among transgender people and men who have sex with men, amid efforts to underscore the effect that criminalization of LGBT communities has on their ability to access HIV prevention and treatment services.

In that context, ICASA's selection of Uganda generated a mixed response from local and international activists, including Winnie Byanyima, UNAIDS’ new executive director, who called for the country to repeal its law criminalizing same-sex relations so that LGBT people can attend the conference. Read more via Devex