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Loading...United States Reports to the UN on LGBT Discrimination
The US has submitted what advocates call an ‘honest’ report on LGBT discrimination to the United Nations.
The report is to the United Nations Committee on Human Rights (UNCHR) concerning the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). It is the fourth such report and the first one by the Obama administration.
Reports submitted under the Bush administration ignored LGBT issues.
The UNCHR conducts periodic reviews and these have proved an important factor in securing change in many countries.
The coalition group the Council for Global Equality described the US submission as “an honest and reflective perspective on the state of LGBT rights in the United States.”
It details where LGBT rights have made progress as well as where they have been held back, citing the blocking in Congress of the repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and the failure to protect LGBT from discrimination in federal law (ENDA).
The Council says that the report provides the legal justification under international law which the United States has subscribed to for Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s recent assertion that “human rights are gay rights and gay rights are human rights, once and for all.”
The UN Committee has recognized rights to privacy and non-discrimination for LGBT individuals under the ICCPR since 1992.
In 2006, the US delegation, which included the head of the civil rights division of the Justice Department, denied these rights and were told by a member of the UN committee that they were demonstrating a lack of awareness of the “longstanding and consistent” jurisprudence of the Committee on these issues.
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Hillary Clinton’s Astonishing LGBT Rights Speech
Read more: Hillary Clinton, human rights, lgbt, obama, state department, united nations
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Recent Comments from Causes
yes, but let's keep guns legal...seriously....in ontario, she would have been charged - as it should…
What a wonderful blessing for this lady.
No breathe, no work! As simple as that!
6 comments
+ add your ownWell, this is progress, little by little.
Thanks for the article.
To Sarah M. What makes you think all LGBT people are born nonconformist? The fact that they aren't born heterosexual?
Sarah M., It might keep their mouths closed in public, but LGBTI people are born nonconformists. Don't imagine it will change anyone.
Obama does good :)
This may tell the GOP to aright their thinking on LGBT. - most of these politicians' outright comments in this Presidential race are appalling and belie the propaganda that USA is an educated 1# World nation!
This may discourage African fundamentalism against Gays that maybe Bush's ignorance of the issue encouraged.
It is imperative that all democratic nations respect and report on all issues of human rights and ending discrimination. This has to include eliminating discrimination against LGBT people. If governments and society can deny the rights of one group, regardless of public support for that group, then the rights of other groups will also be – and in fact, are – denied.
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