OCTOBER 19.2007 IU StiOUt
MIDEAST/AFRICA
Saudi Men Sentenced
to 7,000 Lashes
Coventry
Cycle (/Works
Two Saudi men convicted of sodomy have
Let me earn your business
Portland Metro
Real Estate
Steve
Buchert
Residential Broker
received the first set of 7,000 lashes in punishment,
14 years experience helping
buyers and sellers in Portland
the Okaz daily newspaper reported Oct. 4.
The public whipping took place Oct. 2 in the
southwestern city of Al Bahah, rhe paper said. The
Recumbento
Folding Biked
...and dlore!
men were not named.
After the beatings, they were returned to prison
to await further sets of whippings. The report did not
specify how many lashes are meted out each time.
A crowd of Columbia University students
laughed and booed when President Ahmadinejad
said Iran has no gays.
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President Ahmadinejad:
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Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sak
Tverskoi District Court Judge Natalya Dyatlova
the
demonstrators had
Sept. 24 that there are no homosexuals in Iran.
violated
Answering students’ questions at Columbia
Article 20.2 of the Code on Administrative
University in New York City, he said: “In Iran, we
Offenses by staging an unauthorized public event.
don’t have homosexuals like in your country. We
Only protest organizer Alexey Davydov received
don’t have that in our country. In Iran, we do not
the higher fine.
have this phenomenon; 1 don’t know who’s told
determined
Russia banned gays from donating blood in
you that we have it.”
2001. The general prosecutor’s office has since
The audience laughed and booed.
determined that the ban is illegal, but the ministry
Arsham Parsi, head of the Toronto-based
has failed to lift it, said Nikolai Alekseev of Project
Iranian Queer Organization, posted a reply online
GayRussia.Ru.
that said: “Mr. Ahmadi Nejad, please tell me...who
“We are going to appeal the court decision (and
I am?”
if] necessary, we are ready to take the cases of those
International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights
activists up to the European Court of Human
Commission executive director Paula Ettelbrick
Rights,” he said.
commented: “The Iranian president’s stark denial
of our reality reflects his government’s ongoing
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refusal to recognize the basic human rights of
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organizations have documented widespread and
systematic violations of the rights of members of
The Integral Protection for Marriage and
ese said: “Today’s assertions.. .would be simply absurd
Family Act would bar single parents and same-sex
were it not for the fact that international human
Roger
Mosser
couples from the definition of “family” and punish
rights watchers have long documented some of the
Real Estate Broker
any Guatemalan official who publicly contradicts
most horrific acts of persecution and violence
the definition.
committed against gay people in Iran. These acts of
would define “family” solely as a father, a mother
and their child or children.
the...LGBT community in Iran.”
Human Rights Campaign president Joe Solmon-
“Family essentially originates, exclusively, from
tenor have included incarcerations, beatings and
the conjugal union between a man and a woman...
brutal executions. Ahmadinejad’s denial that there
through marriage or through a legally declared de
are gay people in Iran shows the extent to which he
facto union and other social forms, such as a religious
devalues the lives of the many citizens his govern
ceremony or ritual, custom or cultural practice, as the
ment has and continues to violate.”
only natural design,” the bill states.
Scott Long, director of Human Rights Watch’s
Human Rights Watch denounced the measure
LGBT Rights Program, called Ahmadinejad’s denial
Oct. 1, saying it “would declare that nearly 40 per
of the existence of Iranian gays “a sick joke,” affirm
cent of Guatemalan families.. .are not families at all.”
ing that Iran tortures gays and that the penal code
“This bill takes aim at lesbian and gay couples,
but it has almost half of Guatemalan children and
parents in its sights,” said HRW gay rights researcher
punishes sex between men with the death penalty.
The Columbia Queer Alliance, however, had
The alliance’s executive board issued a letter to
caregivers in the name of a political agenda is not
its members Sept. 23 that contained this admoni
only unjustifiable, it is morally reprehensible.”
tion: “We would like to strongly caution media and
campus organizations against the use of such words
as ‘gay,’ ‘lesbian’ or ‘homosexual’ to describe people
in Iran who engage in same-sex practices and feel
The International Gay and Lesbian Football
same-sex desire. The construction of sexual orien
Association held its 10th World Championship
tation as a social and political identity and all of
from Sept. 23 to 29 in Buenos Aires, drawing 500
the vocabulary therein is a Western cultural idiom.
soccer players from 28 teams around the world.
As such, scholars of sexuality in the Middle East
Argentina’s Los Dogos defeated reigning champ
generally use the terms ‘same-sex practices’ and
Stonewall Fcx>tball Club from London in a 1-0 shut
‘same-sex desire’ in recognition of the inadequacy
of Western terminology.” ©
out Sept. 29 to capture the gay soccer world cup.
Anniversary
Partyl
TVdat cutt
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a different take on the matter.
Juliana Cano Nieto. “Targeting children and their
Gay Soccer Championship
Held in Buenos Aires
Open House
(Warmmg)
and z
Sunday, Nov 4
2-6 pm
.
6234 N. Greeley
*
It was the first time the event, which received
substantial support from the Argentine Ftxitball
R ex WocKNER has reported for the gay press since
Asstxziation, had been held in Latin America. Other
1985. He has a bachelor’s degree in journalism from
sponsors included Delta Air Lines, Manhunt.net and
Drake University and started his career as a radio
the local gay clubs Amerika and Titanic.
reporter.
Windermere
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