Cuba Law for LGBT Rights on the Table
HAVANA TIMES, Jan 17 — Mariela Castro, the daughter of Cuba’s president, hopes the upcoming January 28 conference of the country’s communist party will help end the stalemate around a draft law intended to grant rights to transsexuals and homosexuals on the island.
“I am confident that the party conference will help explicitly define a policy that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, which in turn will help to dismantle prejudices that hinder its adoption,” said the director of the National Center for Sexual Education in an interview published yesterday by the Cuba Si website.
The pending legislation calls for modifications to the Cuban Family Code to legalize same-sex unions. However, the initiative has remained “under consideration” by the Ministry of Justice and the Association of Jurists of Cuba since 2008.
LGBT rights are rights that belong to everyone, not just to a select few. The Party hopefully will recognize and support them fully, for all the Cuban people.