BAGHDAD, Iraq: Iraq’s parliament Saturday passed a bill criminalising same-sex relations, which will receive a sentence of up to 15 years in prison.
The move, however, has been condemned by the rights groups as an “attack on human rights”.
According to the proposed amendments to the anti-prostitution law in 1988, which was approved by the presence of 170 representatives out of 329 members of the parliament, transgender people are sentenced to three years in prison.
An earlier draft proposed the death penalty for same-sex relationships, which activists called a “dangerous” escalation.
In a country where gay and transgender people already face frequent attacks and discrimination, the new reforms mean courts will hand down 10 to 15 years in prison for those who enter same-sex relationships, according to the documents.
It also imposed a minimum of seven years in prison for men who facilitate same-sex relationships, and one to three years for men who “deliberately” act like women.
The revised law criminalizes “biological sex change based on personal desire and inclination” and punishes doctors who perform sex-reassignment surgery on trans people with up to three years in prison.
Homosexuality is taboo in conservative Iraqi society, but so far there have been no laws punishing same-sex relationships.
Members of Iraq’s LGBT community have been prosecuted for sodomy or under vague morality and anti-prostitution clauses in Iraq’s penal code.
“Iraq has effectively codified in law the discrimination and violence members of the LGBTI community have been subjected to with absolute impunity for years,” said Amnesty International’s Iraq researcher Razaw Salihy.
“The amendments concerning LGBTI rights are a violation of fundamental human rights and put at risk Iraqis whose lives are already hounded daily,” Salihy added.
The new law also bans organisations that “promote” homosexuality among society and punish “wife swapping” with a jail sentence of 10 to 15 years.
