Egyptian police arrest 33 men after raiding alleged gay sauna

Egyptian police arrest 33 men after raiding alleged gay sauna

REPORTS have emerged that Egyptian police have arrested 33 men for suspected homosexual conduct after they raided what they believed was a gay sauna in central Cairo.

The men were also allegedly paraded naked in front of the media and onlookers as they were loaded on to trucks.

According to General Ali al-Demerdash, the head of Cairo’s security directorate, the 33 men were arrested “for practising debauchery”.

The men, which includes the sauna owner, face jail terms if convicted.

“The bathhouse owner is accused of turning the facility into a site of immoral and indecent conduct and group homosexuality,” Mohamed Hetta, head of the local prosecution office, told Agence France-Presse.

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

Police raids on Egyptian gay venues have also been on the rise since the Arab Spring saw the fall of autocratic president Hosni Mubarak, but the largest on record was in 2001 — before the Arab Spring — when 52 men were arrested at a Cairo nightclub.

Last month, eight men were jailed for “inciting debauchery” after video of a supposed gay wedding that they were a part of was posted online.

Human rights groups around the world have condemned Egypt’s treatment of its gay citizens, in particular the use of anal testing to determine whether people are homosexual.

H/T: BBC News

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