[News] [Kuwait] Kuwait: Reports highlight police brutality to trans community
Stephanie Stevens
Kuwait: Reports highlight police brutality to trans community
by Dan Littauer
17 January 2012, 9:40am
Kuwaiti police have been torturing and sexually abusing transgender
women continually since 2007, claimed a report released by Human
Rights Watch published yesterday.
The most recent case of police violence was reported on 7 January
2012, where three transgender women were brutally detained. Gay Middle
East has also been reporting on this continual abuse and the rise of
transphobia in general throughout Kuwait following the introduction of
a discriminatory law in 2007 (amendment to article 198) that
arbitrarily criminalizes “imitating the opposite sex” in Kuwait.
Following the introduction of Amendment to article 198 of the Kuwaiti
Penal Code police have been given a free hand to “determine” whether a
person’s appearance constitutes “imitating the opposite sex” without
any specific criteria being laid down for the offense.
These reports, by Human Rights Watch and Gay Middle East (see also
here), reveal how transgender women (individuals born male but
identify as female) suffer daily persecution, physical, sexual, and
emotional abuse both at the hands of the police and the public at
large.
Speaking with Gay Middle East, a transgender Kuwaiti activist pleaded:
“the situation in Kuwait is horrible for us, just intolerable. There
are at least thirteen transgender women in jail right now.” Her
friends have been abused physically, emotionally and at times
sexually.
She also noted that blackmail for sex and money was commonplace. In
addition she stated that Sheikh Sheikh Jaber Mubarak Al-Hamad
Al-Sabah, the Prime Minister of Kuwait, was approached by Human Rights
activists and when he was shown a list of transgender prisoners he
claimed they were arrested for “other offences” and denied the whole
issue. Attempts to interview the prisoners were also denied by the
Kuwaiti authorities. Gay Middle East will publish later this week a
detailed interview with the aforementioned activist.
Human Rights Watch documented that transgender individuals were being
arrested even when they were wearing male clothes, only later to be
forced by police to dress in women’s clothing, who claimed that they
arrested them in that attire.
In some cases documented by Human Rights Watch, transgender women said
police arrested them because they had a “soft voice” or “smooth skin.”
Despite an official recognition of gender identity disorder (GID) by
the Kuwaiti Ministry of Health as a legitimate medical condition, the
law criminalising “imitating the opposite sex” makes no exception for
people who have been diagnosed with GID. In fact there have been cases
where papers have been presented to the police and were ignored.
Gay Middle East calls upon the government of Kuwait to immediately
start proceedings to repeal amendment to article 198 criminalising
“imitating the opposite sex.” The government should immediately halt
the arrests and harassment of transgender individuals and free all
individuals detained by the police. We also call on the government to
commence an investigation into the alleged police brutality and
protect transgender individuals.
HRW report: ‘They Hunt us Down for Fun’: Discrimination and Police
Violence against Transgender Women in
Kuwait.<http://www.hrw.org/reports/2012/01/15/they-hunt-us-down-fun>
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