A Win for LGBT Rights at the Last Big UN Showdown of the Obama Era Mark Leon Goldberg November 22, 2016 Human rights activists dodged a bullet in the General Assembly yesterday when a majority of countries rejected a cynical ploy to defang a newly established LGBT rights watchdog. Countries voted 84 to 77 to keep in place the mandate of the "independent exper...
For the first time, LGBT rights will be formally institutionalized into the human rights mechanisms of the United Nations Mark Leon Goldberg July 1, 2016 The UN Human Rights Council today voted in a hotly contested decision to create a new "independent expert" to probe human rights violations against LGBT people worldwide. The debate leading up to the vote was intense. Culturally conservative countries opposed ...
Just Six Years Ago at the UN, These Five Countries Refused to Even Mention Violence Against LGBT Communities. They Have Evolved. Mark Leon Goldberg June 15, 2016 The Security Council on Monday passed, for the first time, a measure condemning violence against LGBT communities. The measure was unanimously approved in the wake of the Orlando Massacre and was a precedent breaking affirming for many countries that “targetin...
The Orlando Massacre proves that anti-LGBT violence is a threat to international peace and security Mark Leon Goldberg June 13, 2016 Last August, two gay men living under the threat of ISIS testified before a special session of the Security Council, which is the body of the United Nations charged with tackling threats to international peace and security. The United States hosted the special...
Beyond Bathrooms in North Carolina: UN Issues New Global Report on Transphobia and Homophobia in Schools Alanna Shaikh, MPH May 25, 2016 The debate over the safety and welfare of transgender and gay school kids is something that is raging well beyond American borders. A new UNESCO report on education bears an ominous message - violence against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students ...
Why Do These Hacking Deaths Keep Happening in Bangladesh? Sam Fouad April 27, 2016 On April 25, a US Embassy worker, employee of USAID, and editor of Bangladesh’s first LGBT magazine was one of two men hacked to death in Dhaka. Xulhaz Mannan and Tanay Mojumdar were in a flat when five or six men, posing as couriers delivering a package, ente...
Here are the Most and Least Tolerant Countries in Africa Belinda O'Donnell March 3, 2016 Africans are more tolerant of differences in ethnicity, religion and nationality than many familiar narratives would indicate, yet nearly eight out of ten do not want LGBT neighbors, according to a new report from Afrobarometer, a public opinion research organ...
The UN Stamp Collection Just Became a Little More Progressive Mythili Sampathkumar February 5, 2016 The UN Stamp Collection just got a little bit more progressive. At UN headquarters yesterday, the United Nations Postal Administration launched the UN's first series of postage stamps to promote and celebrate LGBT equality around the world. This is a first...
This Gay Syrian Refugee Risked it All. And Lived to Tell His Story to the Security Council Mark Leon Goldberg August 27, 2015 Earlier this week the UN Security Council did something it's never done before: it held a meeting specifically focusing on violence directed against LGBT people. The council called two witnesses, both of whom are gay men caught up in the conflict in the Mi...
