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Dear members, activists, donors, and friends,
With 2022 drawing to a close, we want to thank you for yet another amazing year as we continue to build a rights-respecting world to advance the human rights of LGBTIQ people across Asia – together.
In the past year, ILGA Asia has tripled the growth of staff in our Secretariat, and our membership has increased to over 190 organisations today. Very recently, we have also appointed our first Strategic Development Director, Dr Khine Su Win.
Our colleagues are some of the most inspiring and brilliant people we’ve ever worked with. And because of them, we are able to expand our programs from research and policy, global advocacy, campaigns, and digital advocacy to humanitarian efforts.
Together with the impressive team and our executive leadership, we take pride in ensuring our members’ needs, and solutions are at the very forefront of our work, as we continue to centre and amplify your voices in, within and beyond ILGA Asia, guided by our dedicated Executive and Thai Foundation board members, whose guidance is instrumental to achieving ILGA Asia’s mission.
As Audrey Lorde said, “we need a movement that encourages you and me to define ourselves…and without community, there is no liberation.”
We have recently concluded our 9th ILGA Asia Conference (28 Nov to 2 Dec) in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. This conference is historic and momentous for all of us for a couple of reasons.
Not only did we survive a global pandemic to hold this conference, but it is also worth noting that we had the largest convening of our regional conference ever, with over 450 participants joining us in person.
At this conference, we had the first ever lesbian, non-binary, research, humanitarian, UN advocacy, informal labour and marriage pre-conferences. The credit goes to all of you because you have fought hard for your voices to be heard and for your spaces to be claimed. This is significant to envision the way we will all work together moving forward.
Our members have also voted for a new term of the Executive Board and approved a record-breaking total of 16 amendments to the ILGA Asia Constitution. Among them is a precedent-setting decision paving the way for the representation of non-binary communities and disabled changemakers to be included in the next Executive Board elections at the 10th ILGA Asia Regional Conference, which will be held in Nepal in 2024.
Most excitingly, we held the first ILGA Asia Queer Art Festival (IAQAF) concurrently throughout our conference, which included the first statement by queer Asian artists during the closing plenary. As a community, we believe that artivism (art and activism) must have a space in all that we do.
We thank the Vietnamese government, ICS Center, volunteers and the local community for graciously hosting our conference; and most importantly, we thank each and every one of you who were there with us. What a remarkable achievement we have made. Importantly, we want to acknowledge the progress Vietnam has made in enriching the lives of LGBTIQ people — most recently, in August, for banning conversion therapies. This charts a leading example for neighbouring countries and also across our region to do more, and do better for our community.
Since we last convened in Seoul, South Korea in 2019, our world has changed drastically, and our lives with it. The ongoing challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic affect some more than others, especially in a region like Asia.
Many of us are still coping with the pandemic and its aftermath, and many of our queerblings across Asia are experiencing compounded hardships due to political instability, conflict, rising tides of religious fundamentalisms, anti-gender movements, degrading planetary boundaries, and growing inequalities within countries across the continent.
We must not forget the ongoing global humanitarian crises in our region, such as what’s happening in Afghanistan, Myanmar, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and also Iran.
On that note, we have dedicated our resources while working along with partners to enable accessibility of humanitarian aid to LGBTIQ communities living in peril to fortify our Special Program in response to the ongoing rights violations in Afghanistan, with the most recent gender-based attack being the Taliban enforcing an education ban on Afghan women.
In China, increasing state censorship is shrinking civil spaces and targeting LGBTIQ people, who are becoming more invisible in media, the internet and other areas of public life. Taiwan’s withdrawal from hosting WorldPride 2025 is highlighting the unique situation of LGBTIQ communities in countries that have become the theatre of conflicting geopolitical interests. Over in Japan, despite recent advancements in marriage equality, a Tokyo court just ruled the ban on same-sex marriage as constitutional in a mixed decision.
In Sri Lanka, discriminatory laws and practices continue to violate the rights of LGBTIQ people, and state forces are targeting women HRDs of diverse sexual orientations and gender identities, earning them condemnation from the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women. Over in Pakistan, While the Transgender Act was passed in 2018, it’s being challenged in the Federal Shariyat court by right-wing interest groups, and anti-trans discrimination, harassment and violence persist, even intensifying in recent years. The same is true in Bangladesh, where LGBTIQ people are even more vulnerable to acts such as extortion and murder due to the lack of legal protection.
Murders, judicial harassment, and forced disappearances are threatening LGBTIQ HRDs in the Phillippines, Thailand, and Myanmar – where LGBTIQ communities are caught in the crossfires of the struggle for democracy. In Indonesia, a new criminal code criminalises sex outside of marriage, impacting not just LGBTIQ people, but also women and religious minorities. In Malaysia, crackdowns, raids and arrests are compromising LGBTIQ spaces and isolating communities.
In Iran – where two LGBTIQ activists face the death penalty – our petition with AllOut calling for their release stands close to 120,000 signatories. Over in Qatar, the World Cup may have ended, but the human rights violations and questions over the future legacy of FIFA were left unaddressed, despite our statements and other campaigns as part of the LGBTIQ+ Human Rights Sports Coalition.
However, even in the face of these trials, we have triumphed, and our victories deserve to be celebrated.
Our movements across Asia are securing stronger recognition and protection of LGBTIQ rights and gaining more access to political, social and cultural spaces, where we struggle to put LGBTIQ issues on the agenda.
More and more institutions are affirming our right to live as we are. Some of our queerblings in South Korea can now freely serve in the military as the Supreme court ruled that the military prohibition of same-sex sexual acts should not cover consensual sex in off-duty hours. In Kuwait, a law criminalising trans people was declared unconstitutional, while in Singapore, the colonial-era prohibition of consensual same-sex sexual acts has also been struck down after years of struggle. In Vietnam, the health ministry also affirmed that being LGBTIQ is not an illness, in response to the proliferation of clinics for conversion therapy and other SOGIESC change efforts.
Marriage and family rights are increasingly being protected in some parts of Asia. In Tokyo, same-sex partnerships are now recognised, putting them a step closer to full marriage equality. Similarly, in Thailand, a bill allowing same-sex civil partnerships has secured the approval of the Cabinet. Over in India, queer families are now entitled to social benefits, with the Supreme Court declaring that “familial relationships may take the form of domestic, unmarried partnerships or queer relationships.”
Our struggles are almost paying off, as more success stories of equality are being heard throughout our region. In the Philippines, the SOGIESC Equality Bill was just approved at the committee level and will now move to the second reading at the Senate, becoming the most recent development in their 22-year struggle for legal protection. In India, trans communities are making progress towards recognition in various states, while the Supreme Court is now headed by a chief justice whose judicial record signals support for the LGBTIQ community. In Bhutan, LGBTIQ people are becoming more socially accepted one year after homosexuality was decriminalised, while the government is vowing to do more for LGBTIQ rights.
While our communities are facing different struggles throughout Asia, our grassroots, national and regional organising and solidarity-building are making us closer to the future we demand.
This year, supporting our member organisations and communities across East, West, and South and Southeast Asia was equally as challenging as it was rewarding.
In terms of Global Advocacy, ILGA Asia represented the voices of Asian communities as we called for the renewal of the IE SOGI at the 50th session of the UN Human Rights Council by highlighting the discrimination that LGBTIQ people face throughout Asia.
We supported activists from Korea and Sri Lanka to attend the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) Advocacy Week in Geneva, along with supporting an activist from Mongolia to attend the 82nd session of CEDAW. We also organised a meeting with the Mission of Nepal to the UN to meet activists in New York on the sidelines of the HLPF.
Joining Pride in Bangkok, Seoul and Taiwan also allowed us to interact more closely with our members, participate in their campaigns for equality and publicise the work we do for LGBTIQ communities in Asia.
We moved forward with our work on Research and Policy on LGBTIQ rights in Asia by launching our Briefing Note On the Death Penalty and its Arbitrary Use to Punish LGBTIQ Persons, and our Webinar on Strategic Litigation to Advance LGBTIQ Rights In Asia with ICJ featuring activists and lawyers from across the region
As the pandemic drove us to digitise many aspects of our lives, we saw the opportunity to prioritise our ongoing commitment to communicating and bringing diverse Asian queer communities. In this regard, we:
- Underlined the importance of including LBQT women’s voices to #BreakTheBias,
- Featured trans & non-binary activists for our Trans Day of Visibility Reels Campaign,
- Highlighted issues faced by sex workers again and again,
- Centred indigenous queer issues as key voices in efforts to decolonise our legal systems and minds,
- and so much more.
This also includes the launch of our podcast on LGBT & Faith with the Salzburg Global Seminar’s LGBT* Forum, and our Bridges of Hope Podcast examining the work in our Afghanistan Programme and the plights of LGBTIQ refugees.
To support the work of our communities, we organised the 2022 Campaign Training which focused on increasing the capacity of local CSOs to spearhead their own national advocacy campaign and was participated by over 40 LGBTIQ activists from 12 countries. In anticipation of the year ahead, we are providing grants to several organisations planning innovative and high-impact campaigns in 2023.
Even in the face of our trials, we have triumphed, and our victories deserve to be celebrated.
Along with your support, we want to capture our movement’s collective momentum and use it to chart a way forward to the future we demand — a future where all people are free from discrimination, a future where all people can participate equally in our society, a future where every person have autonomy over their own bodies, a future where you and I can marry the person we love. A future where lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, intersex, queer and all marginalised groups across Asia can live and love freely and equally.
We want to celebrate our community leaders and elders who paved the way before us and taught us to believe that when you know what you stand for, you know what to fight for — we appreciate you. Because of you, we can achieve the milestones thus far. And to every young person and youth among us — we see you, we hear you, and we will always stand with you. You are never alone.
With immense gratitude, we want to thank everyone who has helped us get here — nurtured us, taught us, cheered us on, and dried our tears.
On that encouraging note, and with your support, ILGA Asia will continue to celebrate the power of pride and build a sustainable community across our region to fight for the future we demand.
Happy holidays and have a restful end of the year! We will see you in 2023.
In utmost solidarity,
Chitsanupong “Best” Nithiwana and Esan Regmi
ILGA Asia Executive Board Co-Chairs
Henry Koh
ILGA Asia Executive Director
And all of us at ILGA Asia
