The United Nations security council has held an historic meeting on GLBT rights.
The United Nations Security Council has discussed attacks by the Islamic State (ISIS) on sexual minorities, in the first meeting by the organisation to be focused on gay rights.
The United States and Chile co-sponsored the session, which focused in part on how GLBT persons in the Middle East have become the target of self-styled Islamic State fighters.
U.S. Ambassador Samantha Power told reporters outside the closed session that it was about time the Council discussed this issue. “It’s historic,” she said. “Seventy years after the creation of the U.N. that the fate of GLBT persons who fear for their lives around the world is taking center stage.”
The meeting was not only limited to the Islamic State’s persecution of GLBT persons however, with Power telling reporters “You have countries that have criminalized GLBT status,” she said. “You have societies, of course, that are every bit as unwelcoming as they were 20, 30 years ago.”
Diplomats said that of the 15 Council members two – Chad and Angola – did not attend the meeting.China, Russia, Nigeria and Malaysia did attend, but did not speak during the session.
Article | Levi Joule.
