Gay rights in Pakistan

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There are no gay rights activists in Pakistan and homosexuality is illegal.

Contents 1 Penal Code 2 Persecution and abuse 3 Gay life in the country 3.1 Transgender Community 3.2 HIV and AIDS 4 See also 5 External links

[edit] Penal Code

Section 377, a law introduced by the British government in 1860 criminalizes "carnal knowledge of any man against the order of nature", with a penalty of anywhere from 2 to 10 years.

Islamic law was re-introduced in 1990. Pakistani civil law punishes those who have gay sex with two years to life in prison, while Islamic law, which also can be enforced legally, calls for up to 100 lashes or death by stoning.

[edit] Persecution and abuse

Their have been only a handful of official news reports of the criminal laws against homosexuality being enforced directly. Much of the research of how the law is being enforced falls onto people such as Adnan Aliwas, a Muslim born in Pakistan but moved to the United Kingdom where he helped to start up a UK chapter of Al-Fatiha.

In May 1997, Mohammad Zaman, 38, a mosque worker, was charged with sexually assaulting Fahimullah, a 14-year-old student. Both the man and the boy were lashed publicly in Bara Bazar in Pakistan's western Khyber Agency, an area administered by local Afridi tribespeople for engaging in sodomy. Zaman received 75 blows and the boy got 32 [1].

In 2003 three Pakistani men were arrested in the city of Lahore when one of their relatives turned them in for engaging in homosexuality as a private party [2]. Their punishment is not known.

While the enforcement of the criminal law may be sporadic, it is widely believed that police officers will often blackmail people that know or believe engage in homosexuality in order to extort money from them.

In April 2003, a UN vote on homosexual human rights was derailed at the last minute by an alliance of disapproving countries, including Pakistan.

Four gay men are known to have been granted asylum in Canada and the United States.

[edit] Gay life in the country

Homosexual sex is a taboo subject in Pakistan's conservative society, although their are certain situational examples where homosexuality is tolerated as long as it is discret and the men involved justify it as a result of a lack of access to women.

The Internet has made it easier for gay men and men who have sex with other men to find and meet each other [3].

Prostitution is common and male sex workers out number female sex workers in some red light districts. [4] Boys and young men coerced or forced into sex work are sometimes later arrested under Pakistan's sodomy law. [5]

[edit] Transgender Community

Communities of hijra, a transgender group with roots which stretch back to the Mughal empire, are found in all major cities [6].

[edit] HIV and AIDS

Due to the sensitivity of the topic, there is widespread ignorance about AIDS and HIV. It is estimated that between 70,000 and 80,000 of Pakistan's population of 160 million is HIV positive. [7] Pakistan's numerous male sex workers have little access to information about preventing infection. [8]

[edit] See also

• Human rights in Pakistan
• Transsexualism in Pakistan

[edit] External links

• Global Gayz: Pakistan
• Gay Pakistan - 'less inhibited than West'