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Nigerian safety personnel have arrested greater than 70 younger individuals after accusing them of organising a homosexual wedding ceremony in northeastern Gombe state, a safety spokesman mentioned on Monday, within the newest raid on the LGBTQ neighborhood.
Identical-sex marriage is against the law in Nigeria below a 2014 regulation and Gombe can be one of many majority-Muslim northern states the place Islamic sharia regulation runs parallel to the federal and state justice system.
Personnel of the Nigeria Safety and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), an official paramilitary outfit, on Saturday raided a rest spot in Gombe, the state capital, and rounded up suspects they accused of getting a “homosexual occasion” and deliberate wedding ceremony of two male lovers, mentioned Buhari Saad, NSCDC spokesman in Gombe.
India’s prime court docket refuses to legalise same-sex marriages
India’s prime court docket refuses to legalise same-sex marriages
“We apprehended 76 suspected homosexuals … whereas holding a party organised by one in every of them who was to wed his male bride on the occasion,” Saad mentioned.
The suspects included 59 males and 17 ladies, with 21 of the boys “wilfully confessing being homosexual”, he mentioned.
Attorneys for these arrested couldn’t instantly be contacted for remark or affirmation.
The would-be groom was arrested whereas the bride-to-be fled together with different company, the official mentioned.
“We’ll cost them to court docket to reply for his or her actions as soon as investigation is concluded,” Saad mentioned.
Homosexuality is punishable by demise below sharia in northern Nigeria, though that sentence has by no means been enforced.
In 2014, Nigeria handed new laws outlawing same-sex marriages and the promotion of civil unions.
Nigeria’s Identical Intercourse Marriage (Prohibition) Act carries penalties of as much as 14 years in jail for anybody confirmed to be in a homosexual union.
Saad declined to say whether or not the suspects can be charged below sharia or a standard regulation court docket.
Safety personnel have raided a number of suspected homosexual weddings throughout northern Nigeria in recent times however none of these arrested have been convicted.
In December final 12 months 19 women and men of their 20s had been arrested in northern Nigeria’s largest metropolis of Kano by sharia police known as Hisbah on expenses they organised a homosexual wedding ceremony.
The suspects had been nevertheless admonished and launched with out being taken to court docket.
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