Article posted on June 18, 2012 by Colin Stewart in ERASING 76 CRIMES. Colin Stewart, a 40-year journalism veteran, is publisher of the "Erasing 76 Crimes" blog.
Police raided an LGBT rights workshop today in Uganda’s capital, Kampala.
Amnesty International reported in a press statement that the session, attended by lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) activists, was organized by the the East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Project, which is organizing a series of workshops to improve the local gay community’s ability to report rights abuses.
At least five staff members from the rights organization were arrested along with 12 participants, Amnesty International said, according to the Egypt-based Bikya Masr news website. Participants were from Canada, Rwanda, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.
Some reportedly escaped before the police arrived, having been warned by members of the media that police were on their way.
Police forced their way into some activists’ hotel rooms, the AFP news service reported.
London-based Amnesty International urged police to stop harassing the LGBT community in Uganda.
Michelle Kagari, Amnesty International’s deputy director for Africa, said:
“This ludicrous and senseless harassment of human rights activists has no basis in law whatsoever and has to stop.
“We are seeing a worrying pattern emerging whereby the Ugandan authorities engage in arbitrary activities deliberately designed to intimidate and threaten legitimate human rights work.”
“The participants in this workshop had done absolutely nothing wrong and we call on the police to end this outrageous behaviour which makes a mockery of Uganda’s human rights obligations.”
In a similar action in February, Ugandan ethics minister Simon Lokodo and police broke up a gay rights workshopin Entebbe that he declared an “illegal assembly.”
In March, gay rights activists sued Lokodo. They said Lokodo’s disruption of the workshop violated their constitutionally guaranteed freedom of assembly.
More recently, Lokodo threatened legal action against a proposed conference in Uganda at which religious and political leaders would discuss the effects of the country’s laws against homosexuality.
Police raided an LGBT rights workshop today in Uganda’s capital, Kampala.
Amnesty International reported in a press statement that the session, attended by lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) activists, was organized by the the East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Project, which is organizing a series of workshops to improve the local gay community’s ability to report rights abuses.
At least five staff members from the rights organization were arrested along with 12 participants, Amnesty International said, according to the Egypt-based Bikya Masr news website. Participants were from Canada, Rwanda, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.
Some reportedly escaped before the police arrived, having been warned by members of the media that police were on their way.
Police forced their way into some activists’ hotel rooms, the AFP news service reported.
London-based Amnesty International urged police to stop harassing the LGBT community in Uganda.
Michelle Kagari, Amnesty International’s deputy director for Africa, said:
“This ludicrous and senseless harassment of human rights activists has no basis in law whatsoever and has to stop.
“We are seeing a worrying pattern emerging whereby the Ugandan authorities engage in arbitrary activities deliberately designed to intimidate and threaten legitimate human rights work.”
“The participants in this workshop had done absolutely nothing wrong and we call on the police to end this outrageous behaviour which makes a mockery of Uganda’s human rights obligations.”
In a similar action in February, Ugandan ethics minister Simon Lokodo and police broke up a gay rights workshopin Entebbe that he declared an “illegal assembly.”
In March, gay rights activists sued Lokodo. They said Lokodo’s disruption of the workshop violated their constitutionally guaranteed freedom of assembly.
More recently, Lokodo threatened legal action against a proposed conference in Uganda at which religious and political leaders would discuss the effects of the country’s laws against homosexuality.
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