Advocacy groups in Ghana have welcomed the demise of a bill that would have further criminalized LGBTQ people and outlawed allyship.

President John Mahama on Jan. 14 said the Promotion of Proper Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill that MP Sam George of Ningo-Prampram co-sponsored in 2021 was essentially dead. Mahama made the remarks to a delegation of bishops from the Ghana Catholic Bishop’s Conference.

“If we are teaching our values in schools, we wouldn’t need to pass a bill to enforce family values,” said Mahama. “More than just passing the Family Values Bill, we need to agree on a curriculum that instills these values in our children as they grow.”

The president also said that although MPs passed the bill last February, parliament dissolved before former President Nana Akufo-Ado, whose term ended earlier this month, signed it.

“I don’t know what the promoters of the bill intend to do, but I think we should have a conversation about it again,” said Mahama. “As far as I know, the bill did not get to the president. So, the convention is that all bills that are not assented to law before the expiration of the life of parliament, expire. So that bill effectively is dead.”

LGBT+ Rights Ghana Communications Director Berinyuy Burinyuy said the president’s remarks offer a glimmer of hope for LGBTQ Ghanaians who have long been subjected to systemic discrimination, fear, and violence.

“For many, the mere suggestion that LGBT+ issues could be addressed through education rather than criminalization represents a significant departure from the traditional legislative path championed by the bill’s proponents,” said Burinyuy. “This shift implies a possible opening for dialogue and a more inclusive approach, one that recognizes the need for respect and understanding of diverse sexual identities within Ghanaian society.”

Burinyuy, however, asked about how family values will be incorporated into the educational curriculum.

“Will the curriculum provide a comprehensive, nuanced understanding of human sexuality that respects diversity, or will it risk reinforcing discriminatory attitudes under the guise of cultural preservation?” said Burinyuy. “The fear, particularly among LGBT+ activists is that the emphasis on education could inadvertently foster homophobia in Ghanaian children. If the content is not carefully structured, it could perpetuate harmful stereotypes and deepen existing prejudices.”

“While Mahama may not yet be fully committing to a clear policy direction, his statement leaves open the possibility of a more balanced approach, one that allows for a national conversation on sexual rights without rushing into divisive legislation,” added Burinyuy.

We Are All Ghana said Mahama’s comments are a welcomed approach in addressing anti-LGBTQ sentiments and negative stereotyping.

“We need a holistic educational curriculum for our schools,” said We Are All Ghana. “The children at least deserve to know the truth. There is nothing worse than half baked information.”

Yaw Mensah, an LGBTQ activist, said Mahama is teaching Ghanaians to be tolerant of everyone, regardless of their sexual orientation.

“Mahama is indirectly saying LGBT persons are not Ghana’s problems. Let’s teach families values that accept and respect everyone. Ghanaian values should be tolerance, respect, honesty, hardworking, hospitality, and integrity,” said Mensah. “Those need to be taught and not the hate, discrimination, barbarism, greediness, and hypocrisy that we are seeing in many leaders which transcends into the young ones.”

George has yet to comment on Mensah’s comments about his bill.

UNITED KINGDOM

A memorial for LGBTQ veterans will be built at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire, the British government announced earlier this month. 

Funded by a £350,000 (approximately $425,000) grant from the Office for Veterans’ Affairs, the memorial is part of the government’s response to an independent review of the experience of LGBTQ veterans who served before 2000, when the UK government removed restrictions of queer people service openly in the military. Thousands of LGBTQ soldiers and service personnel were dismissed from the military while the ban was in effect.

The 9’ tall bronze memorial takes the form of a crumpled letter made up of words taken from testimony of former personnel who were impacted by the LGBTQ ban. 

“This is extremely personal for some of our members, some of whom have been affected by the armed forces exclusion of LGBTQ+ identities, and some simply affected by lived queer experience. All our members make a living in the arts by designing and delivering beautiful sculpture, making and inspired by the act of collaboration,” says Nina Bilbey, lead artist at the Abraxis Academy, which collectively designed the memorial.

The design was one of 38 submitted in a nationwide competition and selected by a judging panel that included representatives from Fighting with Pride, a national LGBTQ veterans advocacy group.

The UK government has taken other steps to restore dignity to LGBTQ veterans, including the launch of a financial recognition scheme, qualification of discharge, and restoration of rank, which were launched last December.

“When I joined the Royal Marines in 1999, this abhorrent ban on homosexuality in the armed forces was still in place. A quarter of a century later, we turn a page on that shameful chapter in our national story,” says Veterans Minister Alistair Carns in a statement.

RUSSIA

A Russian man was fined under the country’s LGBTQ propaganda laws for jokingly claiming to be the founder of the “international LGBT movement,” which the Russian Supreme Court declared to be an extremist terrorist organization last year.

Anton Yevdokimov, a pro-democracy activist, was found guilty of spreading “propaganda of non-traditional relations” by a Moscow court last November, but the decision was only made public last week. He was ordered to pay a fine of 100,000 rubles (approximately $975.)

Yevdokimov posted the offending statements on VKontakte, a Russian social media platform, in December 2023, shortly after the Russian Supreme Court declared the “international LGBT movement” to be an extremist terrorist organization.

“Now that they’ve banned LGBT, it’s time to confess: I am the founder and main organizer of the LGBTQ+ extremist organization!” Yevdokimov wrote, according to Novaya Gazeta. 

“I went to Rainbow High School, was recruited there, and now irradiate all homophobes with rainbows! Every time a homophobe looks at a rainbow, they get a tingle in their ass and want to suck dicks,” he wrote, also saying that “KGB cocksuckers” should “be afraid.”

Yevdokimov was already in police detention over a separate social media that is alleged to have “justified terrorism” post when he received the fine.

Russian authorities have stepped up persecution of LGBTQ people and activities since the Supreme Court ruling. Earlier this month, police detained the staff at a restaurant in Yakutsk in the Russian Far East, after the mayor’s office accused the restaurant of hosting performances by visiting queer and transgender artists from Thailand.

TURKEY

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan attacked the country’s LGBTQ community in a speech launching what he’s calling a “year of the family,” aimed at reversing declining birth rates.

Erdogan has long targeted the LGBTQ as a political tactic, even though Turkey’s queer community is relatively low profile. He often portrays LGBTQ rights activists as part of a foreign conspiracy designed to weaken Turkey.

“It is our common responsibility to protect our children and youth from harmful trends and perverse ideologies. Neoliberal cultural trends are crossing borders and penetrating all corners of the world,” he told an audience in the capital, Ankara. “They also lead to LGBT and other movements gaining ground.

“The target of gender neutralization policies, in which LGBT is used as a battering ram, is the family. Criticism of LGBT is immediately silenced, just like the legitimate criticisms of Zionism. Anyone who defends nature and the family is subject to heavy oppression.”

Critics of LGBTQ rights are not routinely silenced in Turkey, as should be evident by the fact that the current president is a vocal critic of LGBTQ rights. Parties opposed to LGBTQ rights make up a majority of the national parliament and run the majority of Turkey’s cities.

It is more accurate to say that the government routinely shuts down speech in favor of LGBTQ rights in Turkey.

Since 2016, Istanbul Pride has been banned every year. People who’ve defied the ban have been subjected to tear gas, plastic bullets, and mass arrests. 

Last year, the city of Istanbul’s film censors banned a screening of the Luca Guadagnino film “Queer,” leading to the cancellation of the film festival it was set to open. 

Erdogan’s announcement came with a suite of policies he says will reverse a trend of declining birth rates, including better income supports for newlyweds and new parents. 

Turkish law does not recognize any same-sex relationships or same-sex parents.

MYANMAR

The military junta that governs Myanmar has banned seven books with LGBTQ themes and has said it will take action against the books’ publishers, according to Radio Free Asia.

The banned books are “A Butterfly Rests on My Heart” by Aung Khant, “1500 Miles to You” and “Love Planted by Hate” by Mahura, Myint Mo’s “Tie the Knot of Love,” “Match Made in Clouds” by DiDi Zaw, “DISO+Extra” by Red in Peace and “Concerned Person U Wai” by Vivian. All the books are published domestically by Myanmar writers.

“These books are not accepted by Myanmar society, they are shameless and the content that can mislead the thinking and feelings of young people,” the Information Ministry said in a statement published in state-run media.

The LGBTQ community typically maintains a low profile in the socially conservative country, where gay sex is still criminalized under a criminal code that was drafted by the British colonial administration in the 19th century. 

LGBTQ people can also be charged or harassed by authorities under laws that criminalize the production and distribution of “obscene” materials. 

Myanmar’s military has had effective control of the government since 1962. A brief democratization in the 2010s ended when the military seized power following the victory of pro-democracy forces in the 2020 election.

A transgender woman with HIV who participated in an anti-government protest in Cuba in 2021 has been released from prison.

Luz Escobar, an independent Cuban journalist who lives in Madrid, on Saturday posted a picture of Brenda Díaz and her mother on her Facebook page.

“Brenda Díaz, a Cuban political prisoner from July 11, was released a few hours ago,” wrote Escobar.

Authorities arrested Díaz in Güira de Melena in Artemisa province after she participated in an anti-government protest on July 11, 2021. She is one of the hundreds of people who authorities took into custody during and after the demonstrations.

A Havana court in 2022 sentenced Díaz to 14 years in prison. She appealed her sentence, but Cuba’s People’s Supreme Court upheld it.

Escobar in her Facebook post said authorities “forced” Díaz to “be in a men’s prison, one of the tortures she suffered.” Mariela Castro, the daughter of former Cuban President Raúl Castro who directs the country’s National Center for Sexual Education, dismissed reports that Díaz suffered mistreatment in prison. A source in Cuba who spoke with the Washington Blade on Saturday said Díaz was held in a prison for people with HIV.

The Cuban government earlier this week began to release prisoners after President Joe Biden said the U.S. would move to lift its designation that the country is a state sponsor of terrorism. The Vatican helped facilitate the deal.

U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who is Cuban American, on Wednesday criticized the deal during his confirmation hearing to become the next secretary of state. President-elect Donald Trump, whose first administration made the terrorism designation in January 2021, will take office on Monday.