Capital punishment for homosexuality
[7]: 65 In 2020, the ILGA stated that Iran and Saudi Arabia were the only countries in which government-sanctioned executions for consensual same-sex sexual activity had taken place since 2000.
[2]: 38, 49, 74 For the countries listed below, no dispute or uncertainty regarding the legal status of capital punishment as a possible penalty for same-sex sexual conduct exists.
[17][16][45][46] Anti-gay purges in Chechnya, a predominantly Muslim region of Russia, have included forced disappearances—secret abductions, imprisonment, and torture—by local Chechen authorities targeting persons based on their perceived sexual orientation.
[47] Of one hundred men, whom authorities detained on suspicion of being gay or bisexual, three have reportedly died after being held in what human rights groups and eyewitnesses have called concentration camps.
[54] Instances of killings by mobs and vigilantes, family violence, and other abuse from the community towards LGBT persons[55][56][57] have been reported in regions of Africa heavily influenced by conservative Christianity and Islam.
[70] The alleged offences were described evasively, the stated reason was Arabic: تجاوزاته السلوكية والأخلاقية التي أقر بها, lit.
'for behavioral and moral violations, to which he confessed',[69] which some western news media interpreted as a euphemism for homosexual activity.
[80] Most jurisdictions removed capital punishment as a sentence for homosexual activity, although in Victoria it remained as such when committed while also inflicting bodily harm or to a person younger than the age of fourteen until 1949.
Homosexuals in the camps suffered an unusual degree of cruelty by their captors, including being used as target practice on shooting ranges.
[89][90][91] In a 1937 speech, Himmler argued that SS men who had served sentences for homosexuality should be transferred to a concentration camp and shot when trying to escape.
[92]: 394 [94] Himmler often commuted the sentence especially if he thought that the accused was not a committed homosexual, but had suffered a one-time mistake (particularly while drunk).
[93]: 12–13 On 4 September 1941 a new law allowed the execution of dangerous sex offenders or habitual criminals when "the protection of the Volksgemeinschaft or the need for just atonement require it".
[96][93]: 13 In 1943, Wilhelm Keitel, head of the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, authorized the death penalty for soldiers convicted of homosexuality in "particularly serious cases".
[98] The last execution took place on 27 November 1835 when James Pratt and John Smith were hanged outside Newgate Prison in London.
The establishment of the United States after their victory in the Revolutionary War did not bring about any changes in the status of capital punishment as a sentence for being convicted of homosexual behavior.
Beginning in the 19th century, the various state legislatures passed legislation which ended the status of capital punishment being used for those who were convicted of homosexual behavior.
Sudanese LGBT+ activists hailed the reform as a 'great first step', but said it was not enough yet, and the end goal should be the decriminalisation of same-sex sexual activity altogether.
