Human Rights Watch Daily Brief, 22 September 2014

As nations around the world convene in New York for the United Nations General Assembly, one important resolution that will come to a vote calls for a bi-annual report on human rights abuses against LGBT people. The resolution, brought by Chile, Uruguay, Colombia and Brazil, has the suport of 40 countries. South Africa is conspicuously absent from the list.  As if the highlight the need for a strong international commitment to protect LGBT rights, Chad's government put forward a draft law that would criminalize homosexual behavior with penalties of up to 20 years in prison.  And a new Pew poll states that the number of people in the United States who consider homosexuality to be a sin rose by five points in the last year, from forty-five to fifty percent.   In Nepal,  a man who had benn protesting the death of his son by  by hunger strike died today.  In Egypt, the hunger strike of Egypt Mohamed Soltan has reached a critical point as the jailed activist is now near death after more than 230 days without food.  The Australian parliament will debate changes to national security laws intended to keep Australians safe this week. But parliament shouldn’t rush to adopt laws that infringe on basic rights and that risk criminalising the legitimate actions of whistle-blowers, journalists and human rights activists.