HIV+ Men Sentenced To Prison In Egypt
Five Egyptian men were convicted of ‘habitual practice of debauchery’— a legal term for consensual homosexual acts – and sentenced to three years in prison after a sweep of arrests that began in October. Four of the five men were found to be HIV positive, after undergoing forced blood tests while in custody.
The men also received an additional three years of police supervision after completing their three-year sentence.
“Two of them cried, screamed, shrieked,” said Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights Defense Lawyer Adel Ramadan. The others “remained silent, but [Ramadan] saw anger in their eyes for the injustice they have been exposed to.”
According to Human Rights Watch, the arrests in October began when police arrested a man after a dispute with another on a Cairo Street. After one man admitted to being HIV positive, the police started to investigate and interrogate them for contact information of other men that could be involved. The men were abused and tortured to “extract confessions” after their arrests.
Human rights groups confirm that Egypt uses “debauchery” charges as means to prosecute and crackdown on people with HIV. The conservative country does not have anti-homosexuality explicitly stated in their laws though obscenity, debauchery and prostitution can all be used as catalysts.
In January, four of the twelve men who were HIV positive were sentenced to one-year prison terms for debauchery. The Egyptian police, however, denied making arrests for a person’s HIV conditions.
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tricky28
said ages ago