Sweden to end ban on blood donations from gay men

STOCKHOLM (AFP) – Sweden will lift its ban on gay blood donors as of March 1, 2010, but will restrict donations to gay men who have not had sex with a man for a year, national health authorities said Tuesday.

"Men who have had sex with men will no longer be permanently barred from donating blood," the National Board of Health and Welfare said in a statement released on World AIDS Day.

Sexual orientation will no longer determine whether a person can give blood. Instead, people who have engaged in "sexually risky behaviour" can be barred as donors for one year.

Read the full article at Yahoo News.

UNAIDS condemns criminalizing being gay

The United Nations’s Joint Program on HIV/AIDS, UNAIDS, released a statement on Tuesday calling for nations to stop criminalizing the LGBT community.

According to the organization, 80 nations still have laws that criminalize gay sex. The organization claims that such laws not only violate human rights, but also undermine effective HIV treatment.

“The human rights of people living with HIV, men who have sex with men, lesbians and transgender people must be fully respected,” UNAIDS stated in a press release on their website. “Where they have been able to access HIV information, prevention and treatment and avoid discrimination, these populations have become a force for health and community empowerment.”

Read the entire article at The Advocate.

Philippines bars LGBT political party from election participation

The Philippines Commission on Elections (Comelec) has blocked the LGBT group Ang Ladlad from registering as a political party. Comelec claims the group is a threat to the nation’s youth.

"We are not condemning the LGBT, but we cannot compromise the well-being of the greater number of people, especially the youth," the commission said

Read the rest of the article at The Advocate.

Judge in Argentina Puts Brakes on Gay Marriage

Updating an earlier story...

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — An Argentine judge put a hold Monday on another court's decision to permit the first gay marriage in Latin America, but supporters of the couple said they would try to go ahead with the ceremony anyway.

The official court Web site said national judge Marta Gomez Alsina ordered the wedding blocked until the issue can be considered by the Supreme Court.

Read the entire article from the AP at Huffington Post.

Gay Argentine Couple to Wed on Tuesday

On Tuesday, Alex Freyre and partner Jose Maria Di Bello, Latin America's first same-sex couple to be granted a marriage, will be wed in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Freyre and Di Bello's forthcoming nuptials have been debated on television, in churches and on the street. Hostile posters can be found on billboards across the city. But, in Di Bello's words, nothing can now prevent him and his partner becoming "husband and husband".
Not surprisingly, the marriage is already being hailed by equality activists as a significant triumph against the odds in a traditionally macho society. Argentina – and Latin America in general – is not known for a tolerance of sexual diversity, and violence against gays is an everyday occurrence.

"This marriage is bigger than José María and I," Freyre told the Observer. "It is a victory for all who face prejudice and discrimination across Latin America and the Caribbean. It is proof that at last the grip of the Catholic church is slipping across Latin America, the system that has kept gay communities silent and fearful is crumbling. What is happening on Tuesday is a strike against those attitudes that have repressed sexual rights across this continent for too long."

Freyre and Di Bello say they will be relieved when the spotlight moves elsewhere after Tuesday's ceremony. "We have people calling us every day saying we are their heroes, people we don't know crying on the phone saying that Tuesday will be the best day of their life," said Freyre. "But we won't want to be heroes, all we wanted to do was get married. And now we've brought a little rainbow to Latin America, it's time for others to take up the banner as well and make us not the exception but the rule."

Read the full article at The Guardian UK.

Shanghai to city's first gay pride festival

A week-long gay pride festival gets under way in Shanghai this weekend, the first time the city has held an event like it.

There will not be a parade. The organisers took legal advice which suggested that might get them into trouble with the authorities.

Instead, there will be film screenings, talks, an art exhibition and a large, all-day party at a privately-owned venue.

Gay sex was decriminalised in 1997 in China. Before that, people used to be prosecuted under "hooliganism" laws.

Homosexuality was described officially as a mental illness in China until 2001.

Although China is a very conservative society, surveys suggest the majority of the population are reasonably tolerant of gay people.

However, there is intense pressure on young Chinese to get married, so it can be difficult for gay Chinese to be open about their sexuality.

Read the rest of the article from the BBC.

Moscow police detain gay protesters

MOSCOW – Riot police broke up several gay rights demonstrations in Moscow on Saturday, hauling away scores of protesters hours before the capital hosted a major international pop music competition.

No injuries were reported, but the detentions could damage Russia's desire to be seen as a modern nation as it holds the finals of the Eurovision song contest, a cultural event televised around the world.

Read the rest of the article from the AP at Yahoo News.

On another note, the mayor of Moscow has repeatedly referred to homosexuality as being "satanic."

An Absolutely F***ED up story out of Senegal

Dakar - Senegalese villagers dug up the body of a man at the weekend, saying he was gay and that they did not want him buried in a Muslim cemetery, police said Monday.

Police in the village of Thies, in the west of the country, were called out after villagers exhumed the body.The man, born in Dakar in 1975, had died in hospital on Saturday of natural causes, said a police officer in the village."

But after his burial the same day in a Muslim cemetery, four people dug him up. The deceased was considered homosexual," the officer said.

You can read the rest of the story at this South African news site. (FYI - homosexuality is illegal in Senegal.)

'They Kill People Like Us' says Gay Iraqi

BAGHDAD – Widespread violence is down across Baghdad, but not for one minority group.

Iraq’s gay population is being targeted by militia groups in a wave of killings that has claimed the lives of up to 25 young men and boys in the past month.

"They know I am gay. I don’t know if I am going to be killed, this is up to God," said Moyad, a 38-year-old Baghdad resident who would not give his last name out of fear for his safety.

Visibly frightened, he said that he has many friends who have been sadistically tortured, some even murdered. "They are sticking glue up their anuses; some hospitals refuse to treat them. Is it a war waged against homosexuals?" he asked.

You can read the rest of this disturbing article at msnbc.com by clicking this link.

Openly Gay Members of Congress Push for Answers about Treatment of Iraqi Gays

Reps. Tammy Baldwin, Barney Frank and Jared Polis have sent a letter to the newly-confirmed U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Christopher Hill, urging him to work with Iraqi officials to end violence against the country’s LGBT population.

Click here to read more about this story gaypolitics.com