CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS

EIPR believes that expanding the employment of Law 10/1961 to go after adults and punish them for consensual sexual relations for the sole reason that their sexual orientations and practices are not socially sanctioned is a clear violation of the rights of these people to privacy and their right to freely make decisions regarding their sexuality. Until there is a serious social dialogue about the legal and constitutional imperative for criminalizing adult consensual sexual relations, we recommend the urgent implementation of the following measures in order to curb the serious violations perpetrated against Egyptian citizens:

The Police:

  • Morality Police should end the practice of pursuing and entrapping individuals with non-normative sexualities and gender identities through LGBTQ dating applications and websites.
  • Police Personnel should refrain from violating the rights of arrested individuals. Those involved in assaulting, insulting, demeaning and threatening detained individuals in habitual practice of debauchery cases with sexual violence, should be held accountable.
  • Police officers should not allow the presence of the media during interrogations nor allow journalists to take pictures of detained individuals and violate their privacy by publishing information and details about their private lives and practices.
  • Should cease presenting the possession of cosmetics, women’s clothing and similar items, whose possession doesn’t constitute a crime, as evidence in debauchery cases.
  • Should cease presenting condoms as evidence in habitual practice of debauchery cases. This practice presents a major threat to the health of gay and transgender women and men who have sex with men.

Public Prosecution:

  • Should issue a periodical buelltin to prohibit forced anal examinations as constituting a form of degrading, harsh and inhumane treatment.
  • Should allow sufficient time between the arrest of suspects and their referral to court in order to allow their lawyers an opportunity to review the records of the arrest and investigative reports.

The Doctors’ Syndicate:

  • Should add an article to the Medical Code of Ethics prohibiting doctors from participating in forced anal examinations, which constitute a form of degrading and inhumane treatment, amounting to torture