US President Biden on Monday called for the “immediate repeal” of Uganda’s severe new anti-gay law and warned he may impose sanctions and other penalties in response.
Driving the news, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni signed legislation Monday that Human Rights Watch notes criminalizes “merely identifying” as LGBTQ and imposes severe punishments for violations related to same-sex relations, including the possibility of the death penalty.
The law provides for the death penalty for the crime of “incitement to violence” and 20 years in prison for the crime of “promoting violence”.
President Museveni signed this law regardless of what European countries and the United States have been saying about the rights of homosexuals.
It is a decision that could lead to aid donors imposing sanctions on the country.
Same-sex relationships are illegal in more than 30 African countries, but their laws don’t go as far on the subject as they do in Uganda.
This law provides for the death penalty for the crime called “insanity accompanied by a criminal motive”. The reasons for the criminalization mentioned in this law include recidivism and the transmission of the HIV virus through intercourse between the same sex. It also provides for a 20-year prison term for the crime of “propaganda of immorality”.
Some gay rights activists say that President Museveni is cracking down on them.
Today they called it sad and black for same-sex partners in Uganda.
The 78-year-old President Museveni said that those who are doing this meeting have deviated from the right way and asked the lawmakers to surrender to what he called “the pressure of the nations”.
Last month, the US government said it was reviewing the impact of the US President’s AIDS Program, PEPFAR, through which aid is being sent to fight AIDS in Uganda.
On Monday, PEPFAR, the international fund established to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria; and the UN Office for AIDS released a joint statement saying that this law endangers AIDS control programs in this country.
Biden said in a statement on the Anti-Homosexuality Act. “This shameful Act is the latest development in an alarming trend of human rights abuses and corruption in Uganda,
“The dangers posed by this democratic backsliding are a threat to everyone residing in Uganda, including U.S. government personnel, the staff of our implementing partners, tourists, members of the business community, and others,” he added.
