Arrests made after Egyptian “gay wedding”

SEVEN men have been arrested in Egypt following the emergence of a video which purportedly showed a gay wedding ceremony taking place within the country.

The men were arrested on Saturday after being identified from the video which was uploaded to website YouTube, reported Aljazeera.

While homosexuality is not explicitly outlawed in Egypt, LGBTI people are regularly accused of breaking public decency laws or scorning religion.

In the video, which took place in April, two men are seen exchanging rings in a ceremony surrounded by friends.

“Nine of the 16 participants were identified in an investigation and seven were arrested,” said Egyptian state news agency MENA.

The seven have been remanded in custody accused of “incitement to debauchery” and “publishing indecent images”.

However, one of the partygoers has since conducted an anonymous interview claiming the wedding was fake and a joke.

While previously turning a blind eye to its LGBTI population, Egypt has since begun to crack down on homosexual activity.

In April, four men were sentenced to eight years in prison for debauchery.

A report from the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights revealed 77 LGBTI people had been arrested since 2001, a figure that excludes the current incident.

One of the biggest such crackdowns against the Egyptian LGBTI community occurred in 2001 when 52 men were arrested when police raided disco taking place on board a boat.