ASEAN SOGIE Caucus
Inclusive and diverse ASEAN
ASEAN SOGIE Caucus
Inclusive and diverse ASEAN
Inclusive and diverse ASEAN
Inclusive and diverse ASEAN
We’re sharing this statement in solidarity with SOGIE rights groups operating in the Middle East and North Africa. It’s by Mantiqitna (a SOGIE group operating in Arab states) recent crackdown and harassment of LGBTIQ in Egypt.
Respecting human rights is the true legitimacy
While the world is celebrating the Human rights day calling for human rights for everyone everywhere, LGBTIQ populations seems to be always left behind.
On December 7th, Egyptian police have raided a bathhouse in central Cairo and arrested 33 men on suspicion of “debauchery” – a charge that has been used against homosexual people in Egypt extensively. Since October 2013, there has been a brutal crackdown on LGBTIQ population in Egypt with the arrest & prosecution for over 200 homosexual & transsexual persons on shameful publicized political trials violating their ground breaking rights to privacy, non discrimination, not to be punished or tortured based on their status, Arbitrary arrest & prosecution in addition to a long list of Human rights that are violated based on their own identity.
On 4 December, the European Union Delegation to Singapore held a seminar commemorating Human Rights Day (10 December). Law professor Dr Thio Li-Ann was invited as the only solo speaker, addressing the topic “International Human Rights Law and National Courts in Asia” – even though she is infamous for having delivered an extremely homophobic speech against the repeal of Singapore’s sodomy laws.
A coalition of Singaporean activists wrote a joint statement and held a silent protest during Dr Thio’s speech. There is some excellent commentary on the protest by Kirsten Tan and Brian Bergen-Aurand. We reproduce the joint statement below:
Statement of concern on Thio Li-Ann as speaker at EU human rights seminar
We, the undersigned, write to express our disappointment at the choice of Prof Thio Li Ann as a speaker for the Human Rights Day seminar hosted by the EEAS European Union Delegation to Singapore.
It is a matter of public record that Prof Thio: –
believes the LGBT community is not entitled to the protections of human rights with respect to issues of sexuality, even between consenting homosexual adults.
Our friends in Myanmar are organising the country’s first LGBT film festival! Here’s some information from their website!
Coming November, Yangon will see the first &PROUD lesbian, gay, bi and transgender film festival. As Myanmar has opened it’s doors to the world, so too has the LGBT community started to become more visible and vocal. The film festival adds to the budding (LGBT) cultural scene and will celebrate the breadth and diversity of Asian LGBT lives. Focusing on films from Southeast Asia and other asian countries, our aim is to showcase films from nearly all ASEAN nations including some homegrown productions from Myanmar.
There’s a series of articles about our work by Alexandra Dmitrianova on the website SimplySxy.
So far, three parts have been published:
This is the first of the eight ‘Stories of Being Me’ films by the B-Change Foundation.
These videos highlight stories from persons of diverse sexual orientation and gender identity. This one’s from Singapore – the others will be from Jakarta, Kathmandu, Bangkok, Phnom Penh, Manila, and Hanoi.
They’ll be hosted on BE web-app, which provides information for young people of diverse sexual orientation and gender identity in 5 languages: Indonesian, Malay language, Simplified Chinese and Thai. These resources will be uploaded gradually.
If you want to help out, here’s what the team says you can do:
A total of 36 workshops on the key themes of the conference, Peace, Justice and Human Rights, Developments and Democratization, were held across 13 venues.
Our representatives on the ground reported that many offered a comprehensive and detailed exploration of the individual issues. These were excellent chances for our reps on the ground to lobby groups to acknowledge the existence of intersectionalities within their constituencies and include SOGIE within their considerations and recommendations.
We, the young people of ASEAN, aspire for the promotion of non-discrimination, equality, peace, protection, sustainability, and inclusive development of the ASEAN community that are in line with the principles and values of human rights, democracy, justice and freedom in all aspects of our lives.
We, the young people of ASEAN, strongly call for the creation of a sustainable rights-based, inclusive, people-centered, and youth-driven regional community.
We, the young people of ASEAN, strongly call for affirmative action by our leaders in ASEAN countries to create an enabling environment at regional, national, and local levels that highly addresses the needs, fulfills the aspirations of young people and ensures youth-embracing Post-2015 Development agenda for the region.
The regional crowd is riotous as the APF 2014 begins, with cheers after every shout out to each ASEAN country. The conference this year is in Myanmar for the first time. Celebrating its first public gay marriage in early March, Myanmar seems to be the perfect host for recognition and change.
This year, the ASEAN SOGIE Caucus collaborated with local NGO Colour Rainbow under the Human Rights Education Institute of Burma and met with local activists.
The key to their participation at the APF is visibility. Early portions of the day were spent touching base with the various communities and committees, and making sure we were seen (in order to be heard – refer to video below!)
Inclusive and diverse ASEAN
Legally Registered in the Philippines as Southeast Asia Sexual Orientation,
Gender Identity and Expression Caucus (ASC), Inc. The organization is in
Special Consultative Status with the UN ECOSOC since 2021.
Quezon City, Philippines
Email: communications@aseansogiecaucus.org
ASEAN SOGIE Caucus © 2025
