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# Sudan remove death penalty & flogging for same-sex relations
- URL: https://www.scenemag.co.uk/sudan-remove-death-penalty-flogging-for-same-sex-relations/
- Published: 2020-07-17T10:30:10.000Z
- Updated: 2020-07-17T09:33:23.000Z
- Description: OutRight Action International reacts to reforms in Sudan resulting in the removal of the death penalty and flogging for same-sex relations.
- Author: Contributor
- Tags: News, Out & About, Queer Corner, gay rights, LGBT, LGBTQ, LGBTQ+ rights, OutRight, Outright Action International

[![](https://www.scenemag.co.uk/content/images/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/07784052600400.jpg)](https://www.scenemag.co.uk/home/)

Several legal reforms have been passed by the **Sovereign Council of Sudan**, including the banning of female genital mutilation, removal of an apostasy law which punished abandonment of Islam with death by stoning, banning public flogging, and an amendment to **article 148** of the Penal Code, which banned same-sex relations and prescribed the death sentence. Following the reforms, same-sex relations remain criminalised and punishable by imprisonment of up to seven years, but application of the death penalty and flogging have been removed.

[![](https://www.scenemag.co.uk/content/images/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/world-data-locator-map-sudan600400.png)](https://www.scenemag.co.uk/home/)

Sudan was one of a handful of countries which explicitly prescribed the death penalty for same-sex relations, the others being **Somalia**, **Saudi Arabia**, **Iran** and **Yemen**. The death penalty is also possible in the **UAE**, **Afghanistan**, **Pakistan**, **Qatar**, **Nigeria** and **Brunei** under sharia laws.

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Maria Sjödin, Deputy Executive Director of **[OutRight Action International](https://outrightinternational.org/?ref=scenemag.co.uk),** said: ‘*The removal of the death penalty for same-sex intimacy in Sudan among other important reforms, such as the banning of female genital mutilation and stoning for apostasy, is an important step for the human rights of LGBTQ+ people, and human rights in Sudan overall.*

*“It is astonishing that over a third of the world’s countries continue to criminalise same-sex love, and even more staggering that a handful prescribe the death penalty for consensual same-sex intimacy. It is encouraging that as of now, that number has been reduced by one. We can only hope that decriminalisation of same-sex love will follow.*‘

[![](https://www.scenemag.co.uk/content/images/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/8745f3f671f42f33b39600.png)](https://www.scenemag.co.uk/home/)

Sixty-seven countries continue to criminalize same-sex relations across the world. Earlier this month the **Senate of Gabon** voted to reverse criminalisation of same-sex relations which had been introduced 2019\. In May 2019 the High Court in **Kenya** decided to maintain a colonial era ban on same-sex relations. A colonial-era ban was overturned in the High Court in **Botswana** in June 2019, but the government is appealing this decision. In March 2020 the High Court in **Singapore** dismissed challenges to its ban on same-sex relations.