============================================= = INTERNATIONAL NEWS #292 - Nov 29, 1999 = = (c) Rex Wockner = ============================================= --> TRANSSEXUAL ELECTED TO NEW ZEALAND PARLIAMENT New Zealanders elected the world's first openly transsexual member of parliament Nov. 27. Georgina Beyer, 42, will represent the nation's conservative Wairarapa region in the southeastern corner of North Island for the Labour party. She beat her nearest opponent, a Conservative, by a vote of 12,693 to 10,189. A nationally known actor and former prostitute, stripper and drag queen, Beyer is also mayor of Carterton, a town of 7,000 people. She changed her gender in 1984. "Of course, I'm feeling quite humbled by this event," Beyer said in an interview with Wockner News. "I think it speaks volumes to minorities in the world that you can overcome adversity and achieve and be successful so that you can be a positive contributor to society." Beyer said no one made an issue of her transsexualism during the campaign except the media. "They always seize upon it as a novelty and it usually ends up working in my favor when they do that because the angle that they try to take, it doesn't discredit me but it certainly tries to push it out there as an issue as to why people would not vote for me," she said. "I have always maintained that the gender question is not the issue. It is the ability of the person to be able to do the job. With the experiences I've had in my life -- but also in my local government career -- I believed that I was the person that was going to be the best for the constituency." Beyer says she'll work on gay and lesbian issues with New Zealand's two openly gay members of Parliament -- Tim Barnett and Chris Carter. Barnett, who represents Christchurch Central, was re-elected Nov. 27. Carter, who will represent the Auckland suburban region of Te Atatu, was re-elected Nov. 27 after having been ousted in the previous parliamentary election. "I will certainly be involved with that," Beyer said. "It would be unthinkable that I wouldn't have some involvement with those issues. It won't necessarily be my primary interest. I represent an electorate now so that has to be my priority, but of course I'll be working with any human rights issues that we need to deal with. "I also serve as a board member of the New Zealand AIDS Foundation and have worked with the gay/lesbian/transgender community in the past -- and I have also portrayed [gay] characters on television and done it successfully -- so I'm definitely part of that community and I'm proud of who and what I am, so there's no problems there," she said. --> TATCHELL THREATENED Peter Tatchell, leader of the British gay-activist group OutRage!, received a death threat at his home Nov. 20 on stationery imprinted with the national colors of Zimbabwe. It read: "Were [sic] out to get you, and stab your filthy queer body to death...DEATH TO ALL HOMOSEXUALS. Now run to the Gay police and beg for protection, because your [sic] going to need it." The letter was mailed from within Britain. On Oct. 30 OutRage! members attempted a citizen's arrest of vocally homophobic Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe in London. They halted his motorcade and Tatchell opened the door of the president's car, grabbed him by the arm and told him he was under arrest. In the moments before police arrived and took Tatchell into custody, he lectured Mugabe on his anti-gay rhetoric. Mugabe has said: "[Homosexuals are] repugnant to my human conscience ... immoral and repulsive. ... Animals in the jungle are better than these people because at least they know that this is a man or a woman. ... I don't believe they have any rights at all. [Gay sex is] an abomination." --> NSW UNEQUAL AGE OF CONSENT REMAINS An attempt to equalize the age of consent in the Australian state of New South Wales was defeated by one vote in the Upper House Nov. 18. Heterosexual and lesbian sex is legal at age 16 while male-male sex is not permitted until age 18. Morals crusader Elaine Nile dragged herself from her sickbed to cast the decisive vote, said the Sydney Morning Herald. --> RUSSIA DROPS GAYS FROM DISEASED LIST The Russian Health Ministry's new classification of mental and behavior disorders no longer categorizes "homosexual orientation" as a "personality disturbance" or any other kind of problem. The change was reported to the International Lesbian and Gay Association Nov. 17 by Prof. T.B. Dmitrieva, director of the Serbsky National Research Center for Social and Forensic Psychiatry. --> ISRAELI HEALTH MINISTER CENSORS ADS Israeli Health Minister Shlomo Benizri ordered his agency to remove pictures of condoms from its World AIDS Day ad campaign. "There are citizens from all sectors of society -- Jews, Arabs, also religious and secular -- that are embarrassed by them [condoms]," Benizri said. "We're not talking here about stupid people in some Third World country." --> GAY PAGEANT HELD IN AFRICAN BOONIES South Africa's Miss Gay SA pageant was staged in the civic center of the rural farming town of Nelspruit Nov. 20 in order to "give rural gays a chance," organizers said. "Our members who live in the sticks are fed up with having to travel to the cities all the time," said activist Markus Buitendach. "The contest will be an annual event and we shall hold it in regional centers to give rural gays a chance. [We chose Nelspruit because it's a] backwater of a bygone era." Some local residents were not happy. There were eight bomb threats before the contest started. "Healthy, normal children who might attend the event can be influenced into abnormal behavior," said the Rev. Thinus Taute, head of the local Afrikaner Protestant Church. "All normal people strongly oppose this so-called gay movement as immoral." Miss Gay Free State, Bernelee Rabeira, was crowned Miss Gay SA. Second place went to Miss Gay Gauteng, Sahara Sheena, and third to Miss Gay Vaal Triangle, Mortisha de Ville. --> CANADIAN PRISONS ALLOW SEX-CHANGE Following settlement of a human-rights complaint, Corrections Canada has authorized inmate Synthia Kavanagh's sex-change surgery and transfer to the British Columbia Correctional Centre for Women. Kavanagh is serving a life sentence for murder. --> MUSEVENI ATTACKS AGAIN Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni lashed out at gays again Nov. 23 while speaking to parliament. Describing how homosexuals are treated in the nation's Ankole region, Museveni said: "These few individuals were either ignored or speared and killed by their parents. They wouldn't just go and wed another man publicly." On Sept. 27, Museveni called for the arrest of all gays for committing "abominable acts." "I have told the CID [Criminal Investigations Department] to look for homosexuals, lock them up and charge them," he said. "Even the Holy Bible spells it out clearly that God created Adam and Eve as wife and husband, but not men to marry fellow men." Uganda's penal code considers gay sex "carnal knowledge of another against the order of nature." The punishment is up to life in prison. Museveni's comments were denounced by the U.S. State Department on Oct. 15. In a written statement, the agency said: "We would view the arrest and imprisonment of persons based on their sexual orientation as a serious human rights violation, regardless of whether such arrests are sanctioned by Ugandan legislation. Uganda is party to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as well as to international conventions on civil and political rights and economic, social and cultural rights. Although they do not specifically address sexual orientation, Uganda's participation in these conventions entails a broad commitment to respect the rights of individuals in general. We urge the Ugandan government to ensure that none of its citizens face harassment or detention as a result of their sexual orientation." -end-