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Senegal effectively outlaws HIV and AIDS work
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Human Rights Watch condemns Senegalââ¬â¢s sodomy laws and unfair sentencing of nine men
"These charges will have a chilling effect on AIDS programmes"
Since we reported how nine men involved in HIV-prevention efforts were jailed for eight years by a judge in Senegal for engaging in “indecent and unnatural acts” and “forming associations of criminals” the Human Rights Watch has spoken out against the country’s anti-gay laws.
The human rights body emphasised the damage the current laws inflict on HIV and AIDS prevention programmes. Scott Long, director of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender rights programme of Human Right Watch elucidated:
"These charges will have a chilling effect on AIDS programmes.
“Outreach workers and people seeking HIV prevention or treatment should not have to worry about police persecution. Senegal should drop these charges and repeal its sodomy law.
“Senegal’s sodomy law invades privacy, criminalises health work, justifies brutality, and feeds fear. This case shows why it is time for the sodomy law to go.”
The men were arrested in December 2008 when police officers confiscated condoms and lubricant during a raid on the private residence of an HIV outreach worker outside the capital, Dakar.
The confiscated items, which are standard HIV-prevention methods, were used as evidence of the men’s homosexual conduct. Each of the accused was found guilty and received the maximum five-year prison sentence, with an additional three years for “conspiracy”.
