Peru Pride gets Oz support

The Australian Consulate in Peru has signed a group statement in support of GLBT rights.

The statement, co-signed by the Belgian, Dutch, Czech, Swedish, American and British embassies and the United Nations Joint Programme on HIV/AIDS in time for this month’s Lima Pride, expresses “support and solidarity with the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered community of Peru” in their efforts to end discrimination on the basis of sexuality and gender identity in the Andean nation.

“On the occasion of the celebrations of this year’s Gay Pride in Peru, we express our support and solidarity with the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community in Peru,” the statement reads.

“We support the right of this community to use this traditional occasion to legally march and meet peacefully with the aim of expressing its desire to end the silence that surrounds those specific subjects that affect them.

“Our governments and international organisations aim to combat such discrimination by promoting the human rights of all people, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

“We call on all governments to ensure that neither sexual orientation nor gender identity be the basis for stigma and discrimination,”

The countries also welcomed the Peruvian government’s signing of the 2006 Organisation of American States Resolution on Human Rights, Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity.

Homosexuality was decriminalised in Peru in 1925 but the GLBT rights situation in the country has been rocky in recent years, with the country’s Interior Ministry banning homosexuals from serving in the country’s police forces last year.

However the country’s Supreme Court overturned the ban by December.