CNA: Singapore won’t repeal homosexual law

Source

By Hoe Yeen Nie, Channel NewsAsia

Posted: 05 July 2009 2015 hrs

SINGAPORE: Law Minister K Shanmugam has said Singapore will not decriminalise gay sex but the courts have the power to decide how the law, Section 377, is applied. Section 377A of the Penal Code deems sex between men a crime.

A recent ruling by the New Delhi High Court legalising gay sex between consenting adults in India raised questions on whether Singapore might go the same way. Both countries share the same Penal Code, inherited from the colonial British.

Today: Gay sex now legal in New Delhi

3 July 2009
Today
Source

Gay sex now legal in New Delhi

NEW DELHI – New Delhi’s highest court issued a landmark ruling yesterday that decriminalised gay sex between consenting adults in India by declaring a colonial-era ban on homosexuality unconstitutional.

The decision by the Delhi High Court was hailed by gay activists here as a historic step in their struggle to achieve equal rights in the deeply conservative country.

ST: Delhi court legalises homosexual acts

3 July 2009
Straits Times (Top stories)

Delhi court legalises homosexual acts

In a landmark decision, British colonial-era law is overturned 
By P. Jayaram, India Correspondent 

NEW DELHI: A court yesterday ruled that homosexual acts between consenting adults are legal in India.

The ruling overturned a British colonial era law similar to the one on Singapore’s books that classifies same-sex practices as criminal offences. They were punishable by up to 10 years in prison in India.

The landmark judgment by the Delhi High Court was hailed by the country’s gay community but drew fire from religious leaders.

NYT: Indian Court Overturns Gay Sex Ban

2 July 2009
New York Times

Indian Court Overturns Gay Sex Ban

By HEATHER TIMMONS and HARI KUMAR
 
NEW DELHI —In a landmark ruling Thursday that could usher in an era of greater freedom for gay men and lesbians in India, New Delhi’s highest court decriminalized homosexuality.

“The inclusiveness that Indian society traditionally displayed, literally in every aspect of life, is manifest in recognizing a role in society for everyone,” judges of the Delhi High Court wrote in a 105-page decision, India’s first to directly address rights for gay men and lesbians. “Those perceived by the majority as ‘deviants’ or ‘different’ are not on that score excluded or ostracized,” the decision said.

Indian Express: Delhi HC legalises gay sex

2 July 2009
Indian Express
Source

Historic judgment: Delhi HC legalises gay sex

In a breakthrough judgment, the Delhi High Court on Thursday legalised gay sex among consenting adults holding that the law making it a criminal offence violates fundamental rights.

However, Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code which criminalises homosexuality, will continue for non-consensual and non-vaginal sex.

“We declare section 377 of IPC in so far as it criminalises consensual sexual acts of adults in private is violative of Articles 14, 21 and 15 of the Constitution,” a Bench comprising Chief Justice A P Shah and Justice S Murlidhar said.

The High Court said ‘the provision of section 377 IPC will continue to govern non-consensual penile non-vaginal sex and penile non vaginal sex involving minors’.

TOI: Delhi High Court legalizes homosexuality

2 July 2009
The Times of India
Source
Delhi High Court legalizes homosexuality
 
NEW DELHI: In a historic judgement, the Delhi High Court on Thursday decriminalized homosexuality by reading down section 377 of the Indian Penal 
Code.

The Section 377 of the IPC as far as it criminalizes gay sex among consenting adults is violation of fundamental rights, said the high court. However, Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code which criminalizes homosexuality, will continue for non-consensual and non-vaginal sex.

LA Times: Answers to questions about Prop 8 ruling

27 May 2009
Los Angeles Times

Source.

Answers to questions about Prop. 8 ruling

Details and implications of the California Supreme Court ruling
By Rong-Gong Lin II

The Times answers readers’ questions about Tuesday’s ruling upholding Proposition 8, the voter-approved constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

On what grounds did the California Supreme Court uphold Proposition 8?

Opponents of the proposition asked the court to overturn the ballot measure on the grounds that banning same-sex marriage changed the tenets of the state Constitution and therefore amounted to a revision, which can be placed on the ballot only by a two-thirds vote of the Legislature. Proposition 8 reached the ballot after a signature drive.

In Tuesday’s ruling, the court said Proposition 8 “adds but a single, simple section to the Constitution” and therefore was a constitutional amendment and not a revision.

NYT: California High Court Upholds Gay Marriage Ban

26 May 2009
New York Times

California High Court Upholds Gay Marriage Ban

By JOHN SCHWARTZ
Published: May 26, 2009

The California Supreme Court upheld a ban on same-sex marriage Tuesday, ratifying a decision made by voters last year. The ruling comes at a time when several state governments have moved in the opposite direction.

The court’s decision does, however, preserve the 18,000 same-sex marriages performed between the justices’ ruling last May that same-sex marriage was constitutionally protected and voters’ passage in November of Proposition 8, which banned it.

Gays under threat in Senegal

25 April 2009
GlobalPost
Link

Gays under threat in Senegal

Local youth leader: “The homosexuals will not escape lynching. They will be fish food.

By Anne Look – GlobalPost

DAKAR, Senegal — A mob gathered near a mosque outside Dakar. They were there to hunt down and kill nine men accused of homosexual acts.

Earlier this week the nine Senegalese AIDS activists were freed from eight-year-prison terms for alleged homosexual acts, but they went into hiding because of death threats from Muslim religious leaders and the general population.

TheAustralian: Gay couple’s court win sets precedent

Source
April 03, 2009

A HOMOSEXUAL couple has won a landmark anti-vilification case against former Brisbane neighbours who had publicly abused them, calling them “faggots” “poofs” and “girls”.

Tim Wilson and his partner, Shane McCollum, are rebuilding their lives after the Supreme Court of Appeal in Queensland threw out their former neighbour Jean Lawson’s last-ditch legal appeal against paying the men $23,000 in compensation for the abuse.

The case has set a legal precedent for gay rights, and Mr Wilson, 45, told The Australian yesterday it was a huge step forward for human rights. “We made history. We didn’t start out to do that. That wasn’t the intention,” Mr Wilson said.

Last year, Ms Lawson, aged in her 60s, and her son Paul, in his 30s, were ordered to pay the compensation after a bitter, long-running neighbourhood dispute in the outer Brisbane suburb of Logan Central, which was sparked by Ms Lawson’s barking dog.

They were also ordered to publish an apology to Mr Wilson and Mr McCollum, 39, in state and local newspapers.

The decision by Queensland’s Anti-Discrimination Tribunal found Ms Lawson and her son had publicly vilified and harassed the couple over their sexuality.