World
Countries urged to offer refuge to LGBTQ Afghans
Taliban has said it will execute gay men

Advocacy groups have urged the U.S. and other countries to offer refuge to LGBTQ Afghans after the Taliban regained control of the country.
“As Afghanistan falls to the Taliban, members of the LGBTIQ community are among those at greatest risk of suffering under Taliban rule,” tweeted the Organization for Migration, Refuge and Asylum on Tuesday. “The international community must act quickly and decisively to aid all those fleeing persecution.”
As #Afghanistan falls to the Taliban, members of the #LGBTIQ community are among those at greatest risk of suffering under Taliban rule. The international community must act quickly and decisively to aid all those fleeing persecution.#asylum
š· credit: Akhter Gulfman/EPA pic.twitter.com/XhyPuvKlVrā ORAM (@ORAMrefugee) August 17, 2021
Stonewall, a British LGBTQ rights group, echoed ORAM’s call.
“LGBTQ+ Afghans have endured routine discrimination, abuse and persecution, including by the state,” said Stonewall CEO Nancy Kelley on Tuesday. “With the Taliban in power we expect this situation to deteriorate further, including the potential for a return to active enforcement of the laws that prohibit same sex relationships.”
LGBTQ+ Afghans have endured routine discrimination, abuse & persecution, including by the state. With the Taliban in power we expect this situation to deteriorate further, including the potential for a return to active enforcement of the laws that prohibit same sex relationships. pic.twitter.com/TLgCPJij5Q
ā Stonewall (@stonewalluk) August 17, 2021
President Biden last month announced U.S. military operations in Afghanistan would end on Aug. 31. The previous White House in 2020 brokered a peace deal with the Taliban that set the stage for the withdrawal.
The Taliban on Sunday entered Kabul, the Afghan capital, and toppled President Ashraf Ghani’s government. Evacuation flights resumed at the city’s Hamid Karzai International Airport on Tuesday, a day after thousands of Afghans who were desperate to leave the country swarmed it.
Media reports indicate a Taliban judge last month said the group would execute gay people if it once again governed Afghanistan.
“Afghanistan already is not a safe place to be LGBTQI+ people,” said Kimahli Powell, executive director of Rainbow Railroad, a Toronto-based organization that assists LGBTQ refugees around the world. “According to the U.S. State Department, public attitudes across the diversity of Afghan society towards LGBTQI+ people are extremely negative, which leads members of the LGBTQ+ community to keep their gender identity and sexual orientation a secret in fear of harassment, intimidation, persecution and death. Now, with the return of the Taliban, there is understandable fear that the situation will worsen.”
“Rainbow Railroad is concerned that the return to power of the Taliban will lead to instances of extreme violence directed at members of the LGBTQI+ community in Afghanistan,” added Powell. “And although it remains to be seen how the Taliban will respond to international pressure to uphold human rights, early signs are not encouraging. Just last month, a Taliban judge threatened that gay men will be crushed to death by toppling walls onto them should the group regain control of Afghanistan.”
Powell said Rainbow Railroad has received 50 “requests for help originating in Afghanistan” so far this year, “and we anticipate an uptick in requests due to the deteriorating security situation that threatens the safety of LGBTQI+ people.”
“Moreover there is very limited human rights defenders and civil society engagement to support LGBTQI+ persons at risk,” said Powell. “However, we are currently relying on our deep international network and contacts within the country in order to reach people at risk. “
‘We don’t know what’s happening’
Charbel Maydaa is the founder and general director of MOSAIC, a Lebanon-based advocacy group that works throughout the Middle East and North Africa. Maydaa is also the first alternate co-chair of ILGA Asia.
Maydaa on Tuesday noted to the Washington Blade that the Taliban use Sharia law to target LGBTQ people. Maydaa noted the Taliban wants “to look good in front of the international community,” but added LGBTQ Afghans who remain in the country are terrified.
“We lost contact with many people there,” said Maydaa. “We don’t know what’s happening. They’re not online or they are really afraid to talk on Facebook.”
Maydaa said three female academics with whom he has worked “disappeared” five days ago. Maydaa told the Blade an LGBTQ person in Kabul with whom he spoke on Monday “didn’t mention anything.”
“He was really afraid to communicate, so he was just like I’m alive. I’m fine,” said Maydaa.
Maydaa said ILGA Asia is currently working to find shelters for LGBTQ people in Afghanistan before they are able to leave the country. Maydaa added ILGA Asia is also “trying to advocate for some governments” to “literally rescue them.”
The Canadian government on Friday announced it will allow up to 20,000 Afghans ā including members of the LGBTQ community ā to resettle in the country.
“Canada will continue to implement the special immigration program for Afghans who contributed to Canadaās efforts in Afghanistan,” a Canadian government spokesperson told the Blade on Monday. “In addition, we will introduce a special program to focus on particularly vulnerable groups that are already welcomed to Canada through existing resettlement streams, including women leaders, human rights defenders, journalists, persecuted religious minorities, LGBTI individuals and family members of previously resettled interpreters.”
“The program will welcome government-supported and privately sponsored refugees, along with those sponsored by family already in Canada,” added the spokesperson. “In the coming weeks and months, we will be engaging with our international and domestic partners to develop a plan for moving forward.”
President Biden on Monday said the U.S. will expand “refuge access to cover other vulnerable Afghans who worked for our embassy; U.S. non-government agencies ā or the U.S. non-governmental organizations and Afghans who otherwise are at great risk; and U.S. news agencies.” State Department spokesperson Ned Price on Monday also said the State Department will “continue to pursue all options to relocate interested and qualified Afghan SIV (Special Immigration Visas) applicants and their immediate families, as well as other vulnerable Afghans.”
Price and Biden in their remarks did not specifically mention LGBTQ Afghans. Rupert Colville, a spokesperson for U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet did not either on Tuesday.
“We call on the international community to extend all possible support to those who may be at imminent risk, and we call on the Taliban to demonstrate through their actions, not just their words, that the fears for the safety of so many people from so many different walks of life are addressed,” said Colville.
Log Cabin Republicans Managing Director Charles Moran on Monday sharply criticized the Biden administration.
“Make no mistake, the reinstatement of the Taliban is a literal death sentence for LGBT Afghans,” said Moran. “Human rights abuses will absolutely increase under this radical regime. The Biden administration talks a tough game about supporting the LGBT community, but that support evidently doesn’t extend to our allies in Kabul.”
“We hope the administration will be held accountable by both parties for this unprecedented disaster, but right now the priority must be to evacuate as many proven U.S. partners and allies from Kabul as possible, including LGBT Afghans,” added Moran.
Powell stressed “now is time for governments to step up and support LGBTQI+ Afghan refugees.” He specifically noted the Canadian government’s announcement.
“Rainbow Railroad is looking forward to engaging with the Canadian government to identify and refer LGBTQI+ Afghans in need of emergency assistance,” said Powell. “We strongly encourage other governments to do the same.”
Argentina
LGBTQ seniors in Argentina face uncertain future
President Javier Milei’s policies have disproportionately impacted retired pensioners

Editor’s note: International News Editor Michael K. Lavers will be on assignment in Argentina and Uruguay through April 12.
Argentina has undergone significant changes in its economic and social policies since President Javier Milei’s inauguration in December 2023. These changes have had a significant impact on various sectors of society, especially retirees and the LGBTQ community.
Mercedes Caracciolo, a 79-year-old sociologist and lesbian activist, shared her experience with the Washington Blade on how the new measures have affected her quality of life.
“Since Milei’s arrival in government, which began with a brutal devaluation, I am more careful in my spending than I was before,” she said.
Although Caracciolo has additional income from rental properties, she recognizes the situation is much more critical for those who exclusively depend on a pension.
With more than 7 million people receiving pensions, many find themselves “scratching the poverty line” due to the loss of purchasing power. The libertarian government’s economic policies have drastically affected their welfare, leading to a wave of protests across the country.
The reduction of social programs and the lack of LGBTQ-specific public policies have deepened the difficulties that seniors already face. The loss of economic stability particularly affects those who have historically lived on the margins, with fewer job opportunities and limited access to a decent retirement. Many older LGBTQ people, who have spent their lives unable to form traditional families, now find themselves without a support network and with an increasingly less present State.
The advance of conservative discourses has also generated a climate of insecurity and fear.
“There is no more sense of security and stability in old age,” Graciela Balestra, a psychologist who is the president of Puerta Abierta a la Diversidad, the first home for LGBTQ seniors in Argentina, explained. “Many LGBTQ+ retirees fear that there are fewer and fewer rights. They see what is happening in Argentina and globally with the advance of the right wing, and they feel that what they worked so hard to achieve is in jeopardy.”
In addition to economic difficulties, the LGBTQ community has faced additional challenges.
Caracciolo noted many supportive spaces have had their government subsidies reduced or eliminated, weakening community networks essential to the well-being of LGBTQ seniors.
“Community networks are also weakened because many of them require state support for certain types of expenses,” she noted.
Balestra warned about the psychological impact.
“Obviously it impacted mental health. There is much more anxiety, there is fear. People who say ‘I’m afraid they’ll kill me’ or ‘I’m afraid to show myself,'” she said. “Before, they used to walk down the street holding hands with their partner, and now they don’t do it anymore. A lot of hopelessness.”
For Balestra, the concern goes beyond the LGBTQ community.
“The economic issue, the rights issue, the fear that something similar to the dictatorship will return. All of this is very scary. And besides, the hopelessness of believing that this is going to continue, that it is not going to change even in the next elections,” she said.
Civil society organizations have denounced an “adjustment” in policies related to gender and diversity that Milei’s government has undertaken. Pride marches in Argentina have become a stage for protests against the president’s policies, especially over his speeches that activists consider hateful towards the LGBTQ community.
Balestra stresses the fear is not only individual, but collective.
“Human rights no longer exist anywhere, women no longer have the place they used to have, they are once again objectified, machismo is on the rise again,” she said. “This brings a lot of despair to older people.”
Despite the climate of uncertainty, Balestra emphasizes resistence forces are still in force.
“We continue working, as always,” she said. “For 25 years at Puerta Abierta we have been doing reflection groups, cultural workshops, social meetings, all with respect to being able to make LGBT people aware of their rights. We never stop meeting, but lately we are talking more and more about these things that we had already left a little behind. The issue of coming out, fear, visibility. Now we have to talk about it again.”
Africa
Report: Anti-LGBTQ discrimination has cost East African countries billions
Open for Business highlights Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, and Rwanda

The economies of four East African countries are losing more than $5 billion a year because of discrimination against LGBTQ people.
The 80-page report that Open for Business, a coalition of leading global organizations that champion LGBTQ inclusion, released in late March focuses on Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, and Rwanda. It attributes the losses to anti-homosexuality laws, and predicts more economic costs if lawmakers implement other harsh anti-LGBTQ measures.
The report notes Uganda is losing $2.4 billion, or 5.2 percent of its GDP, annually because of the Anti-Homosexuality Act that took effect in 2023. Open for Business last October revealed the country had already lost $1.6 billion in foreign direct investment, donor aid, trade, tourism, public health and productivity after President Yoweri Museveni signed the law.
Kenya is losing $1.5 billion, or 1.38 percent of its GDP.
The report warns that enacting the pending Family Protection Bill would cost the country an additional $6.3 billion, or 5.8 percent of its GDP, annually. Opposition MP Peter Kaluma, who has introduced the measure, in January claimed the Biden-Harris administration had blocked it and vowed to have fellow MPs pass it after U.S. President Donald Trump’s inauguration.
Kaluma is a strong supporter of Trump and the Republican Party’s opposition to LGBTQ rights and other far-right conservative ideologies.
Tanzania is losing $1.1 billion, or 1.33 percent of its GDP, because of anti-LGBTQ discrimination. Rwanda is losing $45 million, or .32 percent of its GDP.
Homosexuality is not illegal in Rwanda unlike the other three countries, but consensual same-sex sexual relationships remain taboo. Queer Rwandans also face stigma, discrimination, social exclusion, and arbitrary detention.
āA series of private member bills in Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania have threatened to pull the region back in terms of progress and human rights for LGBTQ+ people, and damage both the ease of doing business and their international reputation,ā states the Open for Business CEO Dominic Arnall.
Arnall notes his organizationās extensive engagement with businesses across East Africa over the last five years has always linked harmful anti-LGBTQ laws to impacts on a countryās investment prospects.
āThe finding lays bare an uncomfortable truth: That laws that harm the LGBTQ+ community are standing in the way of prosperity and growth for all citizens in the region,ā he said.
The report calls for LGBTQ inclusion as part of the region’s broader economic development agenda.
The Open for Business report notes anti-gay violence and discrimination in Tanzania has been on the rise since the late-President John Magufuli came to power in 2015. The country’s punitive anti-homosexuality law with a 30-year prison sentence for consensual same-sex sexual relations was already in place, but queer Tanzanians were generally not systematically targeted.
āReporting of neighbors or community members for suspected homosexuality is frequent and law enforcement officers have been known to pose as members of the LGBTQ+ community to entrap and blackmail LGBTQ+ individuals,ā states the report.
It also notes the Tanzanian governmentās crackdown on websites and social media accounts that promote LGBTQ rights and threatening the arrests of administrators who allow such content. The report concludes this suppression has caused queer people to live in fear and isolation.
Religious organizations, particularly Christian churches in Tanzania, also champion anti-LGBTQ rhetoric by encouraging their followers against tolerating homosexuality and transgender people. Politicians, meanwhile, use anti-LGBTQ narratives to gain support during campaigns.
While Rwanda stands out as the only East African country in which homosexuality is not criminalized and has foreign donors implementing programs that target the queer community, discussing LGBTQ rights in public is rare and same-sex relationships are not legally recognized. The Open for Business report notes this situation creates legal ambiguity and a fragile social environment for queer Rwandans.
āSeveral LGBTQ+ rights organizations have emerged in recent years, mostly in Kigali, although they do not always identify themselves as LGBTQ+ associations and are rarely formally registered, making it difficult for them to receive funding,ā reads the report.
The Rwandan government has rejected calls to criminalize homosexuality, which it considers a āprivate matter.ā It has also been adamant against efforts to protect queer people for fear of domestic opposition and a desire not to politicize the issue like in neighboring countries.
Kenya, like Rwanda, has for a long time been considered more receptive of queer people, “as long as LGBTQ members are not ātoo loud.āā
Anyone convicted under Kenya’s colonial-era sodomy law could face up to 14 years in prison. Efforts to enact a harsh anti-homosexuality law and anti-LGBTQ protests that religious leaders, politicians, and activists have organized have increased homophobia in the country.
āLGBTQ individuals report significant difficulties in securing formal employment, which pushes many of them into more precarious livelihoods in the informal sector,ā states the report.
Trinidad and Tobago
Trinidad and Tobago recriminalizes homosexuality
Court of Appeal on March 25 overturned 2018 ruling

An appeals court in Trinidad and Tobago has recriminalized consensual same-sex sexual relations in the country.
Jason Jones, an LGBTQ activist from Trinidad and Tobago who currently lives in the U.K., in 2017 challenged Sections 13 and 16 of the country’s Sexual Offenses Act. High Court Justice Devindra Rampersad the following year found them unconstitutional.
The country’s government appealed Rampersad’s ruling.
Court of Appeal Justices Nolan Bereaux and Charmaine Pemberton overturned it on March 25. The Daily Express newspaper reported Justice Vasheist Kokaram dissented.
“As an LGBTQ+ citizen of Trinidad and Tobago, this regressive judgement has ripped up my contract as a citizen of T&T and again makes me an unapprehended criminal in the eyes of the law,” said Jones in a statement he posted to social media. “The TT Court of Appeal has effectively put a target on the back of LGBTQIA+ people and made us lower class citizens in our own country.”
Antigua and Barbuda, St. Kitts and Nevis, Barbados, and Dominica are among the countries that have decriminalized consensual same-sex sexual relations in recent years.
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in 2021 issued a decision that said Jamaica must repeal its colonial-era sodomy law. The Jamaican Supreme Court in 2023 ruled against a gay man who challenged it.
A judge on St. Vincent and the Grenadinesās top court last year dismissed two cases that challenged the countryās sodomy laws.
Jones in his statement said he “will be exercising my right of appeal and taking this matter to the” Privy Council, an appellate court for British territories that can also consider cases from Commonwealth countries.
King Charles III is not Trinidad and Tobago’s head of the state, but the country remains part of the Commonwealth.
“I hope justice will be done and these heinous discriminatory laws, a legacy of British colonialism, will be removed by the British courts,” said Jones.
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