South America
Lima Pride march participants send message to Peruvians
More than 50,000 marchers demanded equal rights
LIMA, Peru — Not even the gray skies of Lima could dim the vibrant festivities of the Pride march in Peru’s capital on July 1.
This year marked Lima’s 21st annual Pride parade and organizers told the Washington Blade it was the biggest yet. More than 50,000 Peruvians marched through the historic streets of the city center dancing with drums, flags and posters. But for some at the march, Pride this year took on a different tone.
The theme of this year’s march was “Pride is Democracy.” A huge screen on the stage at the center of the Pride festivities had a message which said: “Pride is democracy: For a true democracy with social justice and representation.”
With this theme in mind, most of the people who spoke to the Blade talked about the state of LGBTQ and intersex rights in Peru and their fight to maintain and improve Peru’s democracy.
“This year, more than eight trans women have been murdered in a truly ruthless way,” said Leila Heurta, the director and founder of Feminas Peru, an NGO dedicated to the empowerment of transgender women. “And that is why we can’t forget the political side of the march. That’s why the motto of this year’s march is: without pride, there is no democracy.”
While Peru is a democracy, it is one of the few countries on the continent that offers zero legal recognition for same-sex couples. Further, as many of the marchers pointed out, police often fail to investigate the deaths of murdered trans women or arrest the culprits.
Jorge Apolaya, one of the organizers of this year’s march, told the Blade he believes Peru’s democracy is backsliding.
“[This year’s march] takes place in a year in which we feel that there are more and more setbacks regarding the political situation of the country,” said Apolaya. “Our democracy is getting weaker and weaker. It is very important for us that we can live in a democracy, because only in a democracy can we demand respect for the human rights of LGBT people.”
Despite the lack of rights and legal protections for LGBTQ and intersex people in Peru, many marchers seemed optimistic about their future.
Steve Arnao, a 36-year-old doctor, attended the march with his boyfriend.
“I see a change that is slowly taking place in Peru,” he told the Blade. “But it is important that each year, we join the march and continue fighting for our rights.”
The battle for LGBTQ and intersex rights in Peru is steep.
According to a 2020 Ipsos survey, only 38 percent of Peruvians were in support of civil unions for same-sex couples — seven percentage points higher than a similar survey in 2014, but still nowhere close to a majority of the country.
A 2023 survey from Ipsos revealed that 98 percent of LGBTQ and intersex people surveyed were either “extremely” or “very” dissatisfied with “the role of the State in guaranteeing rights of diverse families/LGBTIQA+ people.” Fifty-six percent of respondents reported having experienced discrimination.
“We will never lose hope,” says Apolaya. “Even with this Congress, as part of civil society and as part of the social fabric of this country, we will continue demanding that the minimum of democracy that we have persists and that we do not lose it.”
Another prominent group of attendees at the march is one that has been steadily increasing in Peru over the last few years: Venezuelan immigrants. According to the U.S. Agency for International Development, Peru is the second-largest recipient of Venezuelans and the largest host country of Venezuelan asylum seekers worldwide. Peru hosts more than one million Venezuelans, with most of them living in the capital.
Therefore, many LGBTQ and intersex Venezuelans joined Lima’s Pride parade. One of those Venezuelans was Mariangel Rodriguez. Despite living in Lima for nine years, Rodriguez hasn’t always felt comfortable in LGBTQ and intersex spaces in Peru.
“I think part of my concern about not participating in the previous marches was related to the fact that I’m a minority within a minority,” said Rodriguez. “Being a woman, a migrant who comes from a very hard socio-political context … this has transformed the course of my life.”
Rodriguez went on to describe her experiences with discrimination in Peru.
“In many parts of Peru, it is widespread to see migrants as something negative,” said Rodriguez. “And well, in the past, being a Venezuelan person, obviously I have felt the need to protect and take care of myself by avoiding the marches. But generally, this march has meant something very important to me, not only because it was the first time I went, but also because I saw how many things have evolved in such a short time.”
Despite homophobia and transphobia coming from both the left and right in Peru, many activists have noticed a change in attitudes toward LGBTQ and intersex people, especially among the younger generation.
On the sidelines of the march, one mother held a sign which read: “My son has filled my life with colors.” She told the Blade that her only wish for her 18-year-old child is for him to live his life in the way he wants and for him to be happy.
Colombia
Colombia avanza hacia la igualdad para personas trans
Fue aprobado en Comisión Primera de la Cámara la Ley Integral Trans
En un hecho histórico para los derechos humanos en Colombia, la Comisión Primera de la Cámara de Representantes aprobó en primer debate el Proyecto de Ley 122 de 2024, conocido como la Ley Integral Trans, que busca garantizar la igualdad efectiva de las personas con identidades de género diversas en el país. Esta iniciativa, impulsada por más de cien organizaciones sociales defensoras de los derechos LGBTQ, congresistas de la comisión por la Diversidad y personas trans, representa un paso decisivo hacia el reconocimiento pleno de derechos para esta población históricamente marginada.
La Ley Integral Trans propone un marco normativo robusto para enfrentar la discriminación y promover la inclusión. Entre sus principales ejes se destacan el acceso a servicios de salud con enfoque diferencial, el reconocimiento de la identidad de género en todos los ámbitos de la vida, la creación de programas de empleo y educación para personas trans, así como medidas para garantizar el acceso a la justicia y la protección frente a violencias basadas en prejuicios.
Detractores hablan de ‘imposición ideológica
Sin embargo, el avance del proyecto no ha estado exento de polémicas. Algunos sectores conservadores han señalado que la iniciativa representa una “imposición ideológica”. La senadora y precandidata presidencial María Fernanda Cabal anunció públicamente que se opondrá al proyecto de Ley Integral Trans cuando llegue al Senado, argumentando que “todas las personas deben ser tratadas por igual” y que esta propuesta vulneraría un principio constitucional. Estas declaraciones anticipan un debate intenso en las próximas etapas legislativas.
El proyecto también establecelineamientos claros para que las instituciones públicas respeten el nombre y el género con los que las personas trans se identifican, en concordancia con su identidad de género, y contempla procesos de formación y sensibilización en entidades estatales. Además, impulsa políticas públicas en contextos clave como el trabajo, la educación, la cultura y el deporte, promoviendo una vida libre de discriminación y con garantías plenas de participación.
¿Qué sigue para que sea ley?
La Ley aún debe superar varios debates legislativos, incluyendo la plenaria en la Cámara y luego el paso al Senado; pero la sola aprobación en Comisión Primera ya constituye un hito en la lucha por la igualdad y la dignidad de las personas trans en Colombia. En un país donde esta población enfrenta altos niveles de exclusión, violencia y barreras estructurales, este avance legislativo renueva la esperanza de una transformación real.
Desde www.orgullolgbt.co, celebramos este logro, invitamos a unirnos en esta causa impulsándola en los círculos a los que tengamos acceso y reiteramos nuestro compromiso con la visibilidad, los derechos y la vida digna de las personas trans. La #LeyIntegralTrans bautizada “Ley Sara Millerey” en honor de la mujer trans recientemente asesinada en Bello, Antioquia (ver más aquí); no es solo una propuesta normativa: es un acto de justicia que busca asegurar condiciones reales para que todas las personas puedan vivir con libertad, seguridad y respeto por su identidad.
Colombia
Claudia López running for president of Colombia
Former Bogotá mayor married to Sen. Angélica Lozano
Former Bogotá Mayor Claudia López has announced she is running for president of Colombia.
“We begin today and we will win in a year,” she said in a social media post on June 3.
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López, 55, was a student protest movement leader, journalist, and political scientist before she entered politics. López returned to Colombia in 2013 after she earned her PhD in political science at Columbia University.
López in a speech she gave last December after the LGBTQ+ Victory Institute honored her at its annual International LGBTQ Leaders Conference in D.C. noted Juan Francisco “Kiko” Gomez, a former governor of La Guajíra, a department in northern Colombia, threatened to assassinate her because she wrote about his ties to criminal gangs.
A Bogotá judge in 2017 convicted Gómez of ordering members of a paramilitary group to kill former Barrancas Mayor Yandra Brito, her husband, and bodyguard and sentenced him to 55 years in prison.
López in 2014 returned to Colombia, and ran for the country’s Senate as a member of the center-left Green Alliance party after she recovered from breast cancer. López won after a 10-week campaign that cost $80,000.
López in 2018 was her party’s candidate to succeed then-President Juan Manuel Santos when he left office. López in 2019 became the first woman and first lesbian elected mayor of Bogotá, the Colombian capital and the country’s largest city.
López took office on Jan. 1, 2020, less than a month after she married her wife, Colombian Sen. Angélica Lozano. (López was not out when she was elected to the Senate.) López’s mayorship ended on Dec. 31, 2023. She was a 2024 Harvard University Advance Leadership Initiative fellow.
The first-round of Colombia’s presidential election will take place on May 31, 2026.
The country’s 1991 constitution prevents current President Gustavo Petro from seeking re-election.
López declared her candidacy four days before a gunman shot Sen. Miguel Uribe, a member of the opposition Democratic Center party who is seen as a probable presidential candidate, in the head during a rally in Bogotá’s Fontibón neighborhood.
She quickly condemned the shooting. López during an interview with the Washington Blade after the Victory Institute honored her called for an end to polarization in Colombia.
“We need to listen to each other again, we need to have a coffee with each other again, we need to touch each other’s skin,” she said.
López would be Colombia’s first female president if she wins. López would also become the third openly lesbian woman elected head of government — Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir was Iceland’s prime minister from 2009-2013 and Ana Brnabić was Serbia’s prime minister from 2017-2024.
Chile
Gay pharmacist’s murder sparks outrage in Chile
Francisco Albornoz’s body found in remote ravine on June 4
The latest revelations about the tragic death of Francisco Albornoz, a 21-year-old gay pharmacist whose body was found on June 4 in a remote ravine in the O’Higgins region 12 days after he disappeared, has left Chile’s LGBTQ community shocked.
The crime, which was initially surrounded by uncertainty and contradictory theories, has taken a darker and more shocking turn after prosecutors charged Christian González, an Ecuadorian doctor, and José Miguel Baeza, a Chilean chef, in connection with Albornoz’s murder. González and Baeza are in custody while authorities continue to investigate the case.
The Chilean Public Prosecutor’s Office has pointed to a premeditated “criminal plan” to murder Albornoz.
Rossana Folli, the prosecutor who is in charge of the case, says Albornoz died as a a result of traumatic encephalopathy after receiving multiple blows to the head inside an apartment in Ñuñoa, which is just outside of Santiago, the Chilean capital, early on May 24. The Prosecutor’s Office has categorically ruled out that Albornoz died of a drug overdose, as initial reports suggested.
“The fact that motivates and leads to the unfortunate death of Francisco is part of a criminal plan of the two defendants, aimed at ensuring his death and guaranteeing total impunity,” Folli told the court. “The seriousness of the facts led the judge to decree preventive detention for both defendants on the grounds that their freedom represents a danger to public safety.”
Prosecutors during a June 7 hearing that lasted almost eight hours presented conservations from the suspects’ cell phones that they say showed they planned the murder in advance.
“Here we already have one (for Albornoz.) If you bring chloroform, drugs, marijuana, etc.,” read one of the messages.
Security cameras captured the three men entering the apartment where the murder took place together.
Hours later, one of the suspects left with a suitcase and a shopping cart to transport Albornoz’s body, which had been wrapped in a sleeping bag. The route they followed to dispose of the body included a stop to buy drinks, potato chips, gloves, and a rope with which they finally descended a ravine to hide it.
Advocacy groups demand authorities investigate murder as hate crime
Although the Public Prosecutor’s Office has not yet officially classified the murder as a hate crime, LGBTQ organizations are already demanding authorities investigate this angle. Human rights groups have raised concerns over patterns of violence that affect queer people in Chile.
The Zamudio Law and other anti-discrimination laws exist. Activists, however, maintain crimes motivated by a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity are not properly prosecuted.
“This is not just a homicide, it is the cruelest expression of a society that still allows the dehumanization of LGBTQ+ people,” said a statement from Fundación Iguales, one of Chile’s main LGBTQ organizations. “We demand truth, justice, and guarantees of non-repetition.”
The Movement for Homosexual Integration and Liberation (Movilh), meanwhile, indicated that “since the first day the family contacted us, we have been in conversations with the Prosecutor’s Office so that this fatal outcome is thoroughly investigated, including the possible existence of homophobic motivations or components.”
The investigation into Albornoz’s murder continues, and the court has imposed a 90-day deadline for authorities to complete it.
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