Chechnya: LGBT Citizens
Debate between Lord Lexden and Baroness Anelay of St Johns(7 years ago)
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Lord Lexden
My Lords, is it not the case that the Russian Government actively support laws that encourage the oppression of LGBT people throughout their territories?
Baroness Anelay of St Johns
My Lords, the Chechen Republic is a federal subject of the Russian Federation and comes under the authority of the Russian Government in Moscow, so with regard to issues in Chechnya the buck stops with President Putin. With regard to wider issues across Russia, we believe that the situation for LGBT people has deteriorated since the law banning the promotion of non-traditional sexual relations among minors was passed in June 2013. It is a very worrying situation.
LGBTI: Human Rights Conference
Debate between Lord Lexden and Baroness Anelay of St Johns(8 years, 1 month ago)
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Baroness Anelay of St Johns
The noble Lord makes an extremely important point. We have made it clear to Turkey that accession to the European Union comes only to those countries that abide by human rights rules. Of course, Turkey would have to do that. We are concerned about some of the human rights violations which have taken place, particularly with regard to freedom of expression. My right honourable friend the Prime Minister made that clear at recent meetings.
Lord Lexden (Con)
How much priority are the Government giving to their objective of securing the decriminalisation of homosexuality in the many countries where it remains against the law?
Baroness Anelay of St Johns
My noble friend is right to raise this. The UK Government believe that laws to criminalise consensual same-sex relations are wrong and should be changed and this underpins the work that we do, both as Ministers and throughout our posts around the world. We have, of course, carried out a lot of lobbying on this and I am very pleased to see that Mozambique recently changed its penal code so that “acts against nature”, which had previously been widely interpreted as homosexuality, have now been decriminalised.