17 May is The International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia (IDAHoBIT), and the theme for 2022 is ‘Our Bodies, Our Lives, Our Rights’.
The day was first celebrated in 2004 and its aim was to raise awareness of the violence and discrimination faced by the LGBTQ community, including all people who have diverse gender identities or gender expressions.
The date of 17 May was chosen for IDAHoBiT as this was the date in 1990 when the World Health Organisation finally declassified homosexuality as a mental illness. 19 years later, on the 17th of May 2009, France became the first country in the world to officially remove transgender issues from its list of mental illnesses.
In 2021, United States president Joe Biden used IDAHOBIT to highlight efforts to alleviate LGBTQIA+ discrimination and to call on Congress to pass the Equality Act. The same day, Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau, spoke of creating the first federal LGBTQ2 Action Plan ad passing “legislation to fully protect gender identity and expression”.
Although the LGBTQ community is faced with less adversity in some countries, there are still 69 countries where homosexuality is outlawed. 34 of them are members of the UN and 36 are members of the Commonwealth.
Below the full list:
Afghanistan, Algeria, Antigua & Barbuda, Bangladesh, Barbados, Bhutan, Brunei, Burundi, Cameroon, Chad, Comoros, Cook Islands, Dominica, Egypt, Eritrea, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Gambia, Ghana, Grenada, Guinea, Guyana, Iran, Jamaica, Kenya, Kiribati, Kuwait, Lebanon, Liberia, Libya, Malawi, Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritania, Mauritius, Morocco, Myanmar, Namibia, Nigeria, Occupied Palestinian Territory (Gaza Strip), Oman, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Qatar, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and The Grenadines, Samoa, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Singapore, Solomon Islands, Somalia, South Sudan, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Syria, Tanzania, Togo, Tonga, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Tuvalu, Uganda, Uzbekistan, Yemen, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
The death penalty is the legally prescribed punishment for same-sex sexual acts in 6 UN member states: Brunei, Iran, Mauritania, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and in the northern states in Nigeria.
In 5 additional UN member states: Afghanistan, Pakistan, Qatar, Somalia (including Somaliland) and the United Arab Emirates, certain sources indicate that the death penalty could potentially be imposed for consensual same-sex conduct, but there is less legal certainty on the matter.
Sudan repealed the death penalty for consensual same-sex sexual acts in 2020.