Global Protests Against Egyptian Crackdown
The
Data Lounge, May 12, 2003
NEW YORK—International gay civil
rights groups demonstrated in more than a dozen cities worldwide against the
ongoing repression, imprisonment and torture of gay men in Egypt.
The demonstrations, which began Friday, were called to
mark the second anniversary of the raid on the Queen Boat nightclub in Cairo,
which marked an aggressive new chapter in President Hosni Mubarak’s anti-gay
crackdown.
Writer and activist Mubarak Dahir and Amnesty
International’s Michael Heflin addressed a rally outside the Egyptian
mission in New York on Friday, to draw global attention to Cairo’s
repressive policies.
In Washington, Faisal Alam of the American gay Muslim
organization Al-Fatiha, said the protest was planned to refocus world public
opinion on the “human tragedy unfolding in Egypt” recently distracted by
“the war on terrorism and the Iraq war.”
“Our tax dollars, indirectly and directly, fund the
oppression of gay men,” Alam told The Washington Blade. He said the United
States has not made Egypt’s human rights a priority in their relations
“Our own government has virtually done nothing,” he said.
“There are many, many countries, including Egypt, where
their campaigns have increased to root out, to arrest, and to torture the gay
community,” Alam continued. “Under the guise of ‘war on terrorism’
it’s easy to get away with heinous acts. No one will hold them
accountable,” in such an environment, he said, “especially the United
States.”
Democratic members of Congress led by Reps. Barney Frank
of Massachusetts, Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin and Tom Lantos of California sent
a letter to Congress on May 2 asking to “withhold any support for a
U.S.-Egypt Free Trade Agreement until the government of Egypt stops its brutal
systematic persecution of gay men.”
In addition to New York and Washington, protests were
carried out in Berlin, Dublin, Geneva, Hong Kong, London, Madrid, Manila,
Montreal, Paris, Toronto and the Norwegian cities of Bergen and Oslo.
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