Britain Tonga county Island county Pacific homosexual Pride reports Gay Transgender Britain Tonga county Island county Pacific

LGBTQ+ rights lag in Pacific despite Cook Islands’ gay sex move

Reading now: 571
www.gaytimes.co.uk

A move to decriminalise gay sex in the Cook Islands is a welcome step but LGBTQ+ people in the Pacific Islands region still lack basic rights and risk discrimination – or worse – at every turn, activists say.

Lawmakers in the tiny island nation of 15,000 people passed a bill on April 14 to decriminalise same-sex sexual relations, a crime punishable by up to seven years in prison, although the law was rarely, if ever, enforced.

The measure is expected to become law on June 1. Announcing his support for the change in parliament, Prime Minister Mark Brown said the law outlawing homosexual activity – a vestige of British colonial rule – was “a discriminatory and unjust law that goes against our constitution and our values as a nation”. “We have freedom to love who we want to,” he said.

Activists had campaigned for change for more than a decade and the long-awaited parliamentary vote caused “elation”, said Karla Eggleton, who leads Pride Cook Islands, an LGBTQ+ group. “There were lots of tears, lots of hugging,” Eggleton told Openly by phone from Rarotonga, the country’s main island.

Read more on gaytimes.co.uk
The website meaws.com is an aggregator of news from open sources. The source is indicated at the beginning and at the end of the announcement. You can send a complaint on the news if you find it unreliable.

Related News

20.05 / 04:25
guy recommendations Review: Prepare for emotional damage in Echo Theatre’s stunning ‘I and You’
Tyler “T” Lang and Olivia Cinquepalmi in Echo Theatre’s ‘I and You.’ (Courtesy photo)
DMCA