[News] [Kuwait] In Kuwait, transgender people tell of police torture and sexual abuse
Stephanie Stevens
World
In Kuwait, transgender people tell of police torture and sexual abuse
Dan Littauer - Executive Editor of Gay Middle East
January 16th, 2012
Kuwaiti police have been torturing and sexually abusing transgender
women continually since 2007, claims a report released by Human Rights
Watch published yesterday.
The most recent case of police violence was reported on the Jan. 7,
2012 <http://www.7eyad.com/ArticleDetail.aspx?id=4332484> , where
three transgender women were brutally detained.
Gay Middle East has also been reporting
<http://www.gaymiddleeast.com/news/news%20319.htm> 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 13 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 criminalizing “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.
Click the link to read the Human Rights Watch 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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