Rwanda To Vote on Criminalizing Homosexuality Wednesday

[ccharles000]

BTB has just learned that the Rwandan Parliament is scheduled to take up consideration of a change to Rwanda’s penal code which would criminalize homosexuality with a punishment of five to ten years. It would also ban counselling and advocacy that could be interpreted as “encouraging or sensitizing” people to enter into same-sex relationships.

The problematic section in the penal code is article 217 which states that:

Any person who practices, encourages or sensitizes people of the same sex, to sexual relation or any sexual practice, shall be liable for a term of imprisonment ranging from five (5) to ten (10) years and fine ranging from Two Hundred thousand Rwanda Francs (200.000 RwF) to one million (1,000,000)Rwanda francs.”

The fines range from US$350 to US$1750. The average annual income is just US$370.

One key phrase of the proposed penal code, “encourages or sensitizes,” would have the effect of criminalizing advocacy on behalf of LGBT people. It would also severely impact the ability to deliver health services to LGBT people.

http://www.boxturtlebulletin.com/2009/12/15/18129#comments

[Ken Burch]

1. What the hell is going on in Africa this month?

In the mindst of poverty, famine, border disputes, religious clashes, you've got Rwanda and Uganda deciding the main issue on the agenda is...GAYS?

What brought THIS on?

[liberal N proud]

4. One wonders if the missionaries have a role in it.

Nothing to back that up but it sure sounds like fundamentalist Christian bullshit.

[NMMNG]

5. What do you mean "if"?

Of course they do.

[Jamastiene]

6. I think they have been

proselytized and convinced that "sins" are the reasons for their problems. It sure sounds a lot like the Bible Belt mentality in the area where I live. If allowed to do as they wish, many local governments in this area would do the same sorts of things.

[Ken Burch]

7. No doubt.

I can think of a couple in Alaska. At LEAST a couple, actually.

[theHandpuppet]

9. Haven't you heard?

Gays are the cause of all the ills in the world! :sarcasm:

[kenny blankenship]

2. At last something the hutus and tutsis can agree on:

Gays make the perfect scapegoat.

[Hannah Bell]

3. Rwanda: another "Purpose-Driven" nation:

Rick Warren's 'Long-Term Relationship' with Rwanda
Controversial Pastor and Wife Deliver Strong Message to Poverty-Stricken Country
By CYNTHIA MCFADDEN and TED GERSTEIN
July 31, 2008

Rick Warren wants to change the world -- starting in Rwanda.

"I've been coming to Rwanda for three years now," said Warren. "I think this is my 10th extended trip. The Rwanda I read about in the press and the real Rwanda are two different things."

Rick Warren is leading a mission. He went to Rwanda, he says, to help alleviate the suffering in a deeply wounded nation, a place where 200,000 people have HIV and 800,000 children are orphaned.

But how did he wind up in Rwanda preaching his gospel of purpose and hope? Whether by coincidence or divine intervention, it happened in the house of a man named Joe Ritchie, who knew Rwanda's president, Paul Kagame. While visiting Ritchie's Chicago home, Kagame saw Warren's book "The Purpose Driven Life" on a bookshelf and asked to take it.

"Right after that I got the letter from President Kagame saying, 'I'm a man of purpose. Can you come help us rebuild our nation?'" Warren recalled.

http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/story?id=5479972&page=1


lol. *Paul Kagame,* that noted man of God, asked Warren to come:


Warren of Rwanda
By DAVID VAN BIEMA Monday, Aug. 15, 2005

Paul Kagame, president of Rwanda, is not known for hugging pastors. Catholic and Protestant clergy have been convicted in connection with the genocide in his country in 1994, and Kagame has repeatedly stated his disdain for religious organizations. Thus a buzz went up in Kigali's Amahoro Stadium last month when Kagame allowed Rick Warren, pastor of the Saddleback megachurch in Lake Forest, Calif., and author of the best-selling The Purpose-Driven Life, to throw an arm over his shoulders and "pray for the President."

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1093746,00.html



Kagame is a murderer, albeit one funded by "our side".

"During 1990, Kagame went to Fort Leavenworth where the U.S. Army gave him military training. Broadening this connection, the U.S. and U.K. military provided further training and active logistical support to the RPF, which it used to take over power in Rwanda after 1994. After coming to power, Kagame arranged for the RPF to receive further counterinsurgency and combat training from U.S. Special Forces, which was put to use in the 1996-1997 Rwandan-backed military campaign to overthrow the government of neighboring Zaire."


"questions linger about whether or not he had a role in civilian massacres in Rwanda around the time of the 1994 genocide, and his country's occupation, plunder and killings of civilians in the eastern portion of the Democratic Republic of Congo during the Second Congo War, in which an estimated 5.4 million people have died since 1998."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Kagame

"questions linger..." lol.





kagame's massacres were, in fact, one of the real sparks for the rwandan genocide he's sometimes credited with "ending".

Rick warren, kagame, the US are up to their necks in what's going on in this area.

Do you *really* think warren came to prominence without powerful backers, solely on his own merits? It's laughable. Do you *really* think he just "happened" to choose this area for his purpose-driven bullshit, or the murderer Paul Kagame just "happened" to invite ole Rick over to Rwanda/Uganda/Congo, the site of ongoing conflict for power & resources?

Rick Warren = asset of US military-industrial-intelligence complex

[Aristus]

8. You mean Rwanda actually NEEDS an excuse to begin the unconscionable slaughter

of innocent people?

Who knew?

Nice to see them pretending to have justification this time... :sarcasm:

:mad::grr::mad::grr::mad:

[Odin2005]

10. Yuck, just Yuck. Africa is falling into the Dark Ages.