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First Third Of 2024 In Saudi Arabia: Executions Rise By 189% And Portend Another Bloody Year. At Least 71 Currently Facing Execution.

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Since the beginning of 2024 until the end of April, the Ministry of Interior in Saudi Arabia announced the execution of 55 individuals. This figure constitutes a 189% increase compared to the executions in the first third of 2023, which witnessed 19 executions. The European Saudi Organization for Human Rights views these numbers as a clear indication of the Saudi government's continued approach towards executing and issuing death sentences, and that the promises made in recent years have become elusive.

Fear in Uganda’s Gay Community after Death Penalty Threat, Arrests

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Twenty-one-year-old Shamim Pretty has found shelter in a Kampala safe house for the past three years.

Shamim Pretty is not her real name. She told VOA when she was 16 years old, her mother kicked her out of their home after learning that her daughter was transgender. Her mother also called the police.

“When they took me to the police, my mother was there waiting for me,” said Pretty. “They really mistreated me. There was an officer who was very homophobic. He got hold of me and beat me up.”

A group called Icebreakers Uganda provides help to members of the country’s LGBT community. The term LGBT is short for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender.

Icebreakers Uganda set up the Kampala safe house in 2012. That was the year before Ugandan lawmakers voted to increase the punishment for homosexuality from life in prison to death.

Under pressure from Western governments, Uganda overturned the Anti-Homosexuality Act in 2014.

But gay sex remains illegal and members of the LGBT community are commonly harassed in the country.

Elvis Ayesiga is the programs director at Icebreakers Uganda.


“You don’t have anywhere to go, you don’t have money for rent…so we offer space here, usually for one month,” Ayesiga said.

Last month, Uganda’s ethics minister, Simon Lokodo, announced plans to bring back the Anti-Homosexuality Act. So, many homosexuals now live in fear of renewed attacks.

Pepe Julian Onzima works with a non-governmental organization called Sexual Minorities Uganda.

“Already, most (gay) people do not have homes, they do not have education, they are not employed, they are homeless. So, when something like this comes, it threatens even the little safety that they had,” Onzima said.

A Ugandan government spokesman has denied any plan to bring back what some call the “Kill the Gays” bill.

Even so, the LGBT community is frightened by the arrest of 16 gay activists. They were arrested because they had condoms and medicines to prevent the spread of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

A gay Ugandan man told VOA “you do not know who is watching.” He is always careful not to show that he is gay.

Source: VOA news, Halima Athumani, November 9, 2019


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"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." -- Oscar Wilde
Location: Uganda
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First Third Of 2024 In Saudi Arabia: Executions Rise By 189% And Portend Another Bloody Year. At Least 71 Currently Facing Execution.

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