Kazakhstan should reject attempts to restrict LGBT rights

In June, the Ministry of Culture and Information of Kazakhstan explain The department is reviewing a petition titled “We are against open and covert LGBT propaganda in Kazakhstan!”, initiated by the chairman of the Kazakhstan Parents Union, a public association, after it met the threshold for government consideration.

The Kazakh government should reject this discriminatory and defamatory petition, whose proposals would violate human rights across the country.

this petitionA petition seen by Human Rights Watch calls on Kazakh authorities to introduce a law that would ban what it calls “overt and covert LGBT propaganda in Kazakhstan” and penalize such material in the name of “child protection.” This could result in draft legislation or amendments to existing laws. The petition law gives the ministry 40 working days to review the petition and is expected to respond by August 5.

petition Falling outside The petition’s content openly discriminates against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people and abuses child protection rhetoric to restrict fundamental freedoms. It refers to Russia’s laws prohibiting “propaganda of non-traditional sexual relations”, which are widely used in Russia. condemn Human rights bodies. If adopted, thispublicity” The proposal violates Kazakhstan’s international human rights obligations on non-discrimination and freedom of expression, opinion, information, association and assembly.

although International obligationsKazakh law does not include sexual orientation or gender identity as grounds for protection against discrimination, and authorities have in the past Denied Registered as a non-governmental organization working on LGBT rights. In 2023, the United Nations Committee against Torture Express Concerned about “violence committed based on an individual’s actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity” and called on authorities to end such violence.

Harassment, Discrimination and Threats of Violence Colored Daily life for LGBT people in Kazakhstan. If the authorities choose to support this petition, they will make a difficult reality even worse by supporting discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

Kazakhstan’s international partners should publicly condemn the glorification of homophobic and transphobic rhetoric. The government should immediately halt this harmful proposal and work with human rights organizations and LGBT activists to improve protections, not weaken them.