World

I am gay, can I stay?

More and more immigrants to the United States are seeking asylum on the basis of their sexual orientation. Gay activists have reported a rise in such cases, specially from Middle East, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean

Posted On Thursday, October 29, 2009 at 01:57:12 AM

Azevedo, a transgender from Brazil, now lives in New York

Worcester: For weeks, Nathaniel Cunningham and his boyfriend secretly lived together in rural Jamaica. They showed no affection in public and rarely spoke to neighbours.

Then one morning, Cunningham picked up a local newspaper with a front-page story under the headline, “Homosexual Prostitutes Move into Residential Neighborhood”. His address was listed below.

For days afterward, Cunningham said an angry mob gathered on his lawn hurling rocks and bricks and calling them “batty boys” — a Jamaican slang term for gay. Eventually, the pair grabbed what they could and fled on foot.

The story was one of many that Cunningham, living in Worcester, recently shared with a federal immigration judge in his successful bid to win asylum in the United States.

And it’s similar to other stories cited by a small but growing number of other gay, lesbian and transgender asylum seekers who are using US immigration courts to argue that their sexual orientation makes it too dangerous for them to return home.

“I had no choice,” said Andre Azevedo, 39, a transgender man from Brazil who recently won asylum and now lives in New York. “Where I’m from, heterosexual men practice hate crimes against us like a sport, and the police do nothing to stop it,” he added.

Since 1994, sexual orientation has been grounds for asylum in the United States. That’s when former US Attorney General Janet Reno ruled in a case that persecution based on sexual orientation could be potential grounds for asylum.

Until recently, those grounds have been rarely used and such cases represent only a fraction of all asylum cases. But now immigrant and gay activists say more asylum seekers from the Middle East, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean are citing sexual orientation as reasons for seeking asylum.

They say asylum seekers are escaping rape, persecution, violence, and threats of death in places where homosexuality is either outlawed or strongly, socially shunned.

Last year Immigration Equality, a New York-based nonprofit group that helps gay clients with immigration cases, successfully won 55 asylum cases using sexual orientation as grounds, that’s up from 30 wins in 2007 and 27 in 2006.

To win, Cunningham had to revisit painful moments of running from mobs in Jamaica. Even the police would point him out for persecution, he said. In Cunningham’s case, Jamaica’s sodomy laws banning sex between men and “dancehall” music — whose lyrics often advocate violence against gays — made life unbearable.

During his asylum hearing, Azevedo had to recall violent episodes in Brazil when he and a group of transsexuals were attacked. He recalled a transgender woman set on fire. Each time Azevedo said he went to police, the officers didn’t even bother to file a report.

Cunningham however hasn’t gotten over the fear that, at any moment, he may be forced to flee.

	Mail this article Print this article Translate this article	Rate me....
	Share Share Share Share

Contribute/ Share your Opinion