Iraq’s parliament recently passed a bill criminalising same-sex relations and transgender expression. “It doesn’t require any act or doing any activities to actually be punished by the law in Iraq anymore. Simply being born means that you would be punished,” said Amir Ashour, founder of Iraq’s first LGBTQI organisation, IraQueer.
IraQueer advocates for Iraq’s LGBTQI community, provides direct services, and raises awareness through education programmes. But with the new law, more support is needed. “It’s extremely challenging to respond to the new changes. The work that IraQueer does in Iraq has already been very difficult,” Amir explains.
This is why GiveOut launched the LGBTQI Solidarity Fund, to bring together the UK LGBTQI community and allies to show our collective support for organisations like IraQueer, working against the roll back of LGBTQI human rights.
GiveOut’s Head of Grant-making Jason Ball spoke to Amir about the impact of the new legislation on Iraq’s LGBTQI community and the ways in which we can all provide support.
Could you give us some insight as to the current situation in Iraq when it comes to LGBTQI rights?
It’s been an incredibly difficult period for LGBT+ Iraqis. Not that we’ve ever had an easy situation, but recent attacks from the Iraqi government have made the lives of LGBT+ Iraqis even harder.
Just about a month ago, the Iraqi government officially criminalised LGBT+ people simply for being born. It doesn’t require any act or doing any activities to actually be punished by the law in Iraq anymore. Simply being born means that you would be punished with up to 15 years in prison.
That covers gay men, that covers queer women, and it covers trans and queer individuals who have already been the target of all kinds of violence, both verbal and physical, and often results in the killings of a lot of LGBT+ people. For the past 15 years throughout my career, we’ve documented hundreds of LGBT+ people being killed and not even one person being held accountable for these killings. This law is going to give a legal cover to these crimes and enable those criminals to get away with murder, basically.
How is this articulated in the bill, particularly in regards to identifying as LGBTQI?
First of all, the amendment clarifies that the amendment is done to align with “human nature” and the male and female that “god created” and protect the Iraqi society from the “sexual deviancy” that invaded the world. Everything in the amendment should be read through this lens.
Article 7 describes how anyone who intentionally “imitates women” is punished. Identifying (through identification, appearance, etc) as a woman for trans women (this rarely applies to trans men) would suffice. Most trans women who have been killed were killed because of having long hair, wearing “women’s clothes”, or using makeup.
Article 8 describes how “changing sex” which includes “changing your gender” is punished. Identifying with your actual gender rather than the one they were assigned at birth would suffice. In fact, trans women rarely undergo medical treatment in Iraq since it is both illegal and dangerous. Almost all violence and killings of trans women, including those done by government-affiliated forces, were done based on identification and appearance.
Articles like Article 6(2) which punish promoting queerness in any manner, while undefined regarding what constitutes “promoting” queerness, historical practices of violence tell us that they have mostly been based on simply identifying. Rarely has any of the State-sanctioned violence committed in the past been done based on acts of promotion (the activist community is small and invisible). They were mostly based on identification and appearance.
On a personal level, I don’t subscribe to the idea that identification and act are independent. I think at least some of my identification happens through my acts. In my view, being punished for identifying as gay, including through acts, is the same as being punished for being born.
It’d be great to hear from you about how IraQueer is responding, given the current circumstances?
It’s extremely challenging to respond to the new changes. The work that IraQueer does in Iraq has already been challenging.
Now the fact that every employee and the organisation itself, every person that we would serve, and other people who are not even a part of the queer movement, who contribute to the movement in one way or another, are criminals under the law, makes it extremely difficult for us to operate the same way. So a big part of what we’ve been doing is really first try to make sure that the movement knows that IraQueer is not going anywhere. And in fact, we take this criminalisation as an indicator of how much work we’ve been doing for the past decade that is forcing the government to push back even more.
So we’ve been focusing on the community. We’ve been trying to encourage more people to contribute to the movement and to tell us what they need and what they feel like is missing in the movement. Because at the end of the day, for the LGBT+ movement in Iraq to survive or anywhere, honestly, we need queer people to contribute.
However you want to contribute, you need to contribute. So this is a moment for us to all to come together, create an action plan that represents as many of us as possible, and move forward with even more determination than before.
Well, that leads on to the next question around practical actions that us in the UK can do to stand in solidarity with the LGBTQI community in Iraq. So what, in your mind, are some of the things that we can be doing?
I think the easiest thing is to know what organisations like GiveOut are doing, because we are working with organisations like GiveOut and that enables us to access financial opportunities, access advocacy opportunities, learning opportunities. The movement in Iraq is really young, even though I’ve been personally in the movement for almost 15 years.
A lot of the activists are very passionate, very determined, very talented, but also very young, and we need to learn from other groups who have been in existence and fighting for the same rights for the past decades. So share your knowledge, share your resources, both financial and otherwise. Put pressure on your governments, because sadly, you know, a lot of the governments that we wanted to rely on to fight against this law have not been really active to make sure that the law does not pass, and now here we are.
It’s not too late, because, you know, movements go through ups and downs, and the law is not by any means the end of the movement in Iraq. It just is, it’s going to force us to re-strategise and find new ways to make sure that we keep going forward. So reach out to either us, to GiveOut and other partner organisations, and we will give you a laundry list of all the opportunities you can contribute to.
What would the message be that you would like to leave supporters in the UK for this Pride?
The main message, at least on behalf of the queer movement in Iraq, is that a lot of us have been disheartened by the recent developments in Iraq, and a lot of us are discouraged, but I honestly believe, especially because of the queer young activists inside Iraq, that this can only make us stronger. I think the fact that within nine years we’ve been able to do everything we’ve been able to do, and you can visit our website to learn so much about those activities, it just shows you how a small, tiny organisation consisting of 10 people can actually stand against the entire Iraqi government with all of their armed militias supporting them. So imagine how much more we can do if more people join and more supporters from inside and outside of Iraq join.
So the message is really, we’re not going anywhere, and I hope that if you are already in the movement, neither are you, and if you’re not in the movement, you’ll feel passionate enough about the movement to join us, because we’re only going to make it harder for the Iraqi government, and hopefully reach a point where LGBT+ people in Iraq are equal to other citizens, just like we should have been the whole time.
IraQueer is supported under the LGBTQI Solidarity Fund, an exciting initiative by GiveOut to mobilise the UK LGBTQI community and allies to come together to show our collective support for LGBTQI communities worldwide. With support from foundations and the UK government through the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), GiveOut is building a pool of match funding to double the impact of donations by individual and corporate donors.