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Uganda's President: 'We Have No Homosexuals'

Finland's Gay-Registered Partnership Law Takes Effect

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Uganda's President: 'We Have No Homosexuals'

Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni

Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni told the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Australia March 3 that there are no homosexuals in Uganda.

Museveni made the remark while accepting an award honoring Ugandan government programs that have dramatically reduced the nation's HIV infection rate.

"First, it [HIV] goes through unprotected sex. We don't have homosexuals in Uganda so this is mainly heterosexual transmission," Museveni said.

Museveni previously has acknowledged Uganda's gays and denounced them. In 1999, speaking to parliament about how homosexuals are treated in the nation's Ankole region, he said:

"These few individuals were either ignored or speared and killed by their parents. They wouldn't just go and wed another man publicly."

Also in 1999, Museveni said:

"I have told the CID[Criminal Investigations Department] to look for homosexuals, lock them up and charge them. Even the Holy Bible spells it out clearly that God created Adam and Eve as wife and husband, but not men to marry fellow men."

Uganda's penal code considers gay sex "carnal knowledge of another against the order of nature." The punishment is up to life in prison.

Finland's Gay-Registered Partnership Law Takes Effect

Finland's gay registered-partnership law took effect March 8.

The measure passed Parliament last September by a 99-84 vote.

The law treats registered same-sex couples the same as married couples except in the areas of adoption and name changes.

Dozens of couples tied the knot around the nation as the measure came into force.

Rainer Hiltunen, secretary general of SETA, the National Organization for Sexual Equality, said the law is significant but does not go far enough.

"It's a compromise and does not give gay couples exactly the same rights as married couples," he said.

Other nations that grant many, most or all marriage rights to same-sex couples include Canada, Denmark (and Greenland), Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, The Netherlands (the only nation where gay couples, including foreign residents, can marry under the same laws as straight couples), Norway, Portugal, Sweden and, in the United States, the state of Vermont.

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President Yoweri Museveni
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