I had been trying to avoid it for hours last night but couldn’t escape it any longer, as it was all over social media. “Xulhaz Mannan, 35, the editor at Bangladesh’s first LGBT magazine Roopbaan, along with Tonoy Mojumdar, a fellow activist, was hacked to death.” Many news reports read like this and all I was left wondering was how to process that piece of information. I had come to believe that in this digital age, only things related to the internet could be hacked; not people. I went back to the countless Facebook conversations where I and Xulhaz had talked about our mutual struggles, discussing the intersections within our work while envisioning a trans-national South Asian Queer solidarity.
Bangladesh: 'Anyone could become a target’: wave of Islamist killings
There is an eerie feeling out on the streets of Bangladesh. To some of the city’s academics, activists and gay community, Dhaka now feels more dangerous than a war zone, after a spate of machete attacks by Islamist groups, including the murder last week of the founder of Bangladesh’s first magazine for the gay community.
At least 16 people have died in such attacks in the past three years, among them six secular bloggers, two university professors, an Italian priest, two other foreigners working in the development sector, and a prominent gay activist.
“I am more worried now here than I ever was in Afghanistan, where the threats were more of an existential nature,” says a gay American who has spent time in the war-torn country and now lives in Bangladesh. He asked not to be named.
Among his friends to have died were Xulhaz Mannan, a prominent activist – founder of Roopbaan, the country’s only magazine for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community – and Mannan’s friend, Mahbub Rabbi Tonoy. Six to seven assailants pretending to be from a courier company forced their way into Mannan’s apartment and hacked the two men to death last week.
Homosexuality is illegal in Bangladesh and many members of the gay community were already living in fear of being identified. Now they also have to fear for their lives – and the murders have in effect outed many young people by forcing them to change their daily routine. Read more via the Guardian
Uganda: Anti-LGBT persecution increased law
A new report from the Sexual Minorities Uganda (SMUG) indicates persecution based on sexual orientation and gender identity increased after the country’s president signed an anti-gay law in 2014.
The report documents 264 “verified cases of human rights abuses against LGBTI Ugandans” between May 2014 and Dec. 31, 2015. Forty-eight of the 264 cases of anti-LGBT persecution involved violence, which included “torture by the state.”
President Yoweri Museveni in February 2014 signed the Anti-Homosexuality Act under which those convicted of repeated same-sex sexual acts faced life in prison.
“When the president signed the law the citizens felt they were more empowered and they had a right to actually take action against the LGBTI people,” SMUG Research and Documentation Officer Richard Lusimbo said. Read more via Washington Blade
US: After North Carolina’s law, trans suicide hotline calls double
Anti-transgender bathroom laws like North Carolina’s HB2 are not just inconvenient for transgender people. They may also be life-threatening.
Greta Gustava Martela, co-founder of Trans Lifeline, a crisis hotline for transgender people, said that their call volume has “nearly doubled” since North Carolina restricted the use of public bathrooms based on birth certificate gender markers.
The spike in calls to the Trans Lifeline is sadly unsurprising. Dr. Seelman cautions that we cannot yet “interpret causality” from the data but believes that it should still act as a warning to lawmakers who seek to restrict bathroom use for transgender people.
“We know that stigma and lifetime discrimination influence suicide rates, whether we’re talking about transgender people or another marginalized group,” she told The Daily Beast. “Policies like HB 2 are not solving a problem—they are actually making things worse.” Read more via The Daily Beast
Australia: Transgender woman raped ‘over 2000 times’ in men’s prison
Mary was still as the car pulled closer towards the threatening prison gates and a place that was soon to become her hell on earth. As she stepped into the reception area of the jail, she felt all eyes fall upon her as she continued to walk closer to her cell.
See Mary, not her real name, wasn’t just any “normal” prisoner — she was a transgender woman who was about to be locked behind bars with men. Mary was sickened by what happened to her in that Queensland prison, Boggo Road, as it was known in the 90s.
She has lived in fear for decades, with regular flashbacks to the disturbing things she lived through while in jail. Read more via news.com.au
Kuwait: 41 men arrested in 'gay raid' of massage parlor
41 allegedly ‘gay men and trans women’ have been arrested for prostituting themselves in a massage parlor in Kuwait.
Police sent an undercover officer to the parlor in the capital of Kuwait City to pay for a ‘massage’, a cost of 10 dinars ($33, €30) and then negotiated for the sexual services.
Homosexuality is effectively illegal in Kuwait. Breaking the law of ‘debauchery’, which is most often used to target the LGBTI community, is punished by prison time of up to six years. In 2015, police launched a crackdown on what they branded as ‘cross-dressers’. Prostitution is also illegal, but is very common. Read more via Gay Star News
Nigeria: Hunting down gays
President Muhammadu Buhari has stood firm in support of anti-gay laws, despite pressure for its repeal, particularly from the United States. Under his administration, gay people will be arrested and prosecuted based on the law.
Incidents like the arrest of Lawal and Tahir and their guests in a supposed marriage ceremony are rare, but not unprecedented, particularly in northern Nigeria. Similar arrests have taken place in Bauchi and Kano, where witnesses say suspects were often tortured in detention and forced to give names of other gay people they know to the police.
In recent times, a number of human-rights activists have accused the police of arresting and detaining perceived homosexuals without cause, except for the purpose of extorting money from detainees to allow them to get out of jail.
Not long after the anti-gay law was passed, the UN agency fighting AIDS and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria expressed “deep concern that access to HIV services for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people will be severely affected” in the country, which has an estimated 3.4 million people living with the HIV virus. About half of that number are women, but unprotected intercourse among men puts them at especially high risk.
US: Economic impact of HB2 mushrooms
The recent passage of anti-LGBT legislation in North Carolina and Mississippi has triggered protests and growing corporate backlash, with some companies refusing to expand in the states and high-profile performers canceling events.
The economic impact of the state’s controversial House Bill 2 continued to mushroom Tuesday, as Deutsche Bank announced it was freezing plans to create 250 jobs in Cary and a top Wake County economic development official said that five companies since early last week have canceled or postponed efforts to bring jobs to the county. Read more via WRAL
Morocco: Homosexual couple in Morocco tortured... then imprisoned for defending themselves
A video showing a homosexual couple being tortured has provoked widespread condemnation throughout Morocco, where attacks against homosexuals are on the rise. But perhaps the most shocking part is the way in which the authorities reacted.
A Moroccan court on Monday released two men convicted of homosexuality, which normally carries a jail sentence in the kingdom, in a case that stirred emotions throughout the country. The court also jailed two men convicted of attacking the couple, while outside two topless Femen activists from France were detained and deported after protesting for Rabat to decriminalise homosexuality. Residents of the town of Beni Mellal in central Morocco, meanwhile, gathered to demand the release of the jailed attackers.
A first victim was sentenced to four months in jail for "acts against nature", but an appeal hearing decided Monday to release him on time served. The other victim was handed a four-month suspended sentence for "sexual deviancy".
For the attack on the couple, one defendant was handed a six-month prison sentence and another received four months for forced entry, resorting to violence and carrying weapons. Two others were acquitted and a fifth was to be tried later in a minors' court. Rights organisations have demanded that Morocco decriminalise homosexuality, which is punishable by up to three years in jail. Read more via Morocco News
Dominican Republic: Gay Pride and Prejudice
Shortly after taking up his post as American ambassador to the Dominican Republic in November 2013, Wally Brewster got a bit of unsolicited advice from the Vatican’s envoy to the Caribbean nation.
“If you keep your private life behind the walls of your embassy, you’ll be O.K. here,” Nuncio Jude Thaddeus Okolo told Mr. Brewster. He meant that Mr. Brewster, to be an effective diplomat, would be wise to keep his husband, Bob Satawake, out of sight in a country where prejudice against gay people remains widespread.
The advice went unheeded. Mr. Brewster and Mr. Satawake, who have been together for nearly 28 years, have been out and proud in Santo Domingo, sparking a spirited debate that has galvanized the nation’s fledgling gay rights movement and outraged local leaders of the Catholic Church.
The attacks against Mr. Brewster, a Chicago businessman who raised money for President Obama’s re-election campaign, began just days after the White House nominated him for the post. Read more via New York Times
Honduras: Massive rise in homophobic killings since Zelaya toppled
A new report from Index on Censorship exposes how many LGBT activists in Honduras risk torture, prison and assassination. The research from Index on Censorship, published by SAGE, carried out by journalist Duncan Tucker and utilising data collected by on-the-ground NGOs, delves into some shocking statistics:
Of the 235 murders of LGBT people since 1994, only 48 cases (20%) have gone to court.
"I've been imprisoned on many occasions. I've suffered torture and sexual violence because of my activism, and I've survived many assassination attempts," Honduran gay rights activist Donny Reyes said in an interview with Index on Censorship. Read more via Phys
New ISIS Video Shows ‘Gay’ Man Thrown to Death & Destruction of Churches
In a new video purportedly released by the Islamic State titled “The Voice of Virtue in Deterring Hell,” ISIS religious police are shown implementing sharia law with stonings, executions, and beheadings in ISIS-occupied lands. The video was released on April 6, 2016 on ISIS terrorist channels. An alternative translation of the title is “The Voice of Virtue in Deterring the Underworld.”
The video is ontage of ISIS religious police carrying out sharia law, with both the destruction of Christian structures, along with “haram” things like cigarettes and alcohol, and also doling out punishments. Punishments in the video include hand amputations for thieves, the murder of accused homosexuals with stonings, and a variety of beheadings. Read more via Heavy