NEWS FLASH

Nigeria’s Equality Group: Anti-Gay Bill Will Escalate Hate Crimes Against LGBT Community | The Queer Alliance of Nigeria, a group promoting the well being and the rights of sexual minorities, is urging Nigeria’s Senate to abandon legislation that would further criminalize gay behavior. Nigerians already face up to 14 years in prison for engaging in homosexual sex acts, and the Senate is now seeking to advance a measure that would outlaw same-sex marriage in a country where such unions are not recognized. “This bill will escalate the tension that we are already experiencing as a result of our sexuality,” Rashidi Williams, the group’s executive director, warns in a statement to Nigeria’s National Assembly. “[I]n Nigeria violence against sexual minorities are frequent and occur on a daily basis, mostly under-reported. People with same sex orientation are being attacked by members of the society, using the discriminatory laws that exist in our statue books and religious texts to fuel their acts,” he added. Read the full statement here.