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Learn Spanish Photos Editorial Letters Opinion Columnists Public Forum Who We Are About Us Contact Us Advertise with us Subscribe to our Newsletter Links Page     SPECIAL REPORTS - Tuesday 01 February 2005 < Back   Send this Page To a Friend HUMAN RIGHTS-CHILE: Supreme Homophobia Daniela Estrada SANTIAGO,(IPS) - The Chilean Supreme Court of Justice has been singled out as the Chilean institution most hostile to sexual minorities in 2004, according to a report released by one of the country's leading gay rights organisations. ”We find it very troubling that the Supreme Court, which is responsible for guaranteeing equality before the law, is at the top of the list of the country's most homophobic institutions for the second year in a row,” Rolando Jiménez, president of Chile's Movement for Homosexual Integration and Liberation (MOVILH), told IPS. The 90-page document also notes that the 46 violations of the rights of sexual minorities reported last year in Chile reflect a 30 percent decrease in comparison with 2003. However, the violations committed in 2004 were marked by a higher degree of ”brutality”, says the report. Published by MOVILH, with the cooperation of the human rights watchdog Amnesty International, the Third Annual Report on the Human Rights of Chilean Sexual Minorities provides a detailed compilation of the cases of discrimination reported in 2004, as well as a list of the institutions and individuals who reflected the most homophobic attitudes during the year. The Chilean Supreme Court owes its top ranking this year to decisions adopted in cases involving two high-ranking judges. One of them is Daniel Calvo, who was removed from his post as a member of the Santiago Court of Appeals in January 2004 after a local television station, Chilevisión, reported on his visits to a steam bath frequented by gay men, although Calvo himself has always denied being a homosexual. According to the Supreme Court authorities, Calvo's conduct was ”incompatible” with his role as the head of an ongoing investigation into a paedophile ring, in which a well-known businessman and two senators are implicated. The second strike against the country's highest court resulted from its decision to strip Judge Karen Atala of custody of her three children after she publicly declared that she was a lesbian and that she lived with another woman. Custody was granted to the children's father. MOVILH president Jiménez referred to the two Supreme Court decisions as ”highly symbolic rulings” that served to ”legalise discrimination” of sexual minorities. During socialist Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero's visit to Chile last Wednesday, MOVILH sent him a letter praising his government's policies towards sexual minorities, and particularly his support for a bill that will grant same-sex couples the same rights as their heterosexual peers. On the list of institutions that demonstrated openly homophobic stances last year, high rankings were also given to a number of educational institutions, including the private University of the Andes, the Catholic Church, and four conservative civil society organisations: Create Life, Focus on the Family, Family Action and Our Voice. The human rights violations compiled in the report included the case of senior high school student Gabriela Martínez, 18, who was expelled from the San Ramón Polytechnic in Santiago after school authorities spotted her near the school holding hands with her 17-year-old girlfriend. In response to a complaint filed by MOVILH, the Ministry of Education demanded that the expulsion of this otherwise exemplary student be revoked. The school was eventually obliged to comply. One of the cases that most deeply shocked the country last year was the violent sexual assault of transsexual Ximena Sotomayor (formerly known as Eduardo Soto Núñez), in the central Chilean city of Valparaíso on Nov. 8. Sotomayor required surgery after being savagely beaten by a group of men, who also forced a bottle up her anus. ”We are seeing greater violence on the part of groups opposed to equality before the law for homosexuals. There was even a neo-Nazi march against the gay community planned last May,” said Jiménez. Among the most significant events of the year 2004, the MOVILH report highlighted the legal victory scored by the newspaper Opus Gay. The conservative Catholic group Opus Dei had filed a complaint with the Chilean intellectual property authorities, on the basis of the similarity between the two names, but after a two-year legal battle, the case was settled in favour of the gay publication. As for the individuals deemed guilty of the most openly homophobic attitudes last year, the list was headed by Víctor Vicencio, who was tried and convicted for the murder of a transsexual, and the judges who passed sentence in the cases of Judges Atala and Calvo. Also on the list are the president of the co-governing Christian Democratic Party (PDC), Senator Adolfo Zaldívar, for his public statements against the nomination of homosexuals to political posts, and Senator-designate Jorge Martínez Busch, for promoting the exclusion of gays from the armed forces. In a more positive vein, the report celebrated the growing participation of other sectors of civil society in protests against anti-gay measures and statements, a phenomenon attributed to greater acceptance of sexual minorities by the general public and the media. The director of the Chilean chapter of Amnesty International, Sergio Laurenti, told IPS that the government needs to make a greater effort to educate the public on human rights, ”because this is undoubtedly the best lesson that a person can learn in life,” he said. ”We should also highlight the decrease in cases of discrimination in the armed forces and security sector,” added Laurenti, noting that not a single complaint of anti-gay physical or verbal abuse by the police was reported in 2004. This is especially significant, given that the police have often justified such acts under article 373 of the Chilean Penal Code, which makes them responsible for ensuring ”decency and proper conduct.” The gay community is particularly pleased with Chile's signing last May of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights resolution on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, which makes specific reference to ”killings committed for any discriminatory reason, including sexual orientation.” Socialist Party lawmaker Juan Bustos told IPS that the Chilean Congress is currently debating a proposed reform to the country's constitution ”to establish the exclusion of all forms of discrimination, especially in the case of sexual minorities, which should be adopted in June of this year.” Also in the works is a comprehensive anti-discrimination law. The bill, drafted by the government of moderate socialist President Ricardo Lagos, will be submitted to the Congress for debate this coming March. In addition, the Chilean parliament is scheduled to vote this month on a draft resolution condemning homophobic hate crimes and calling on the government, courts and law enforcement agencies to adopt a series of measures aimed at doing justice for the victims of these crimes. The draft resolution was presented by MOVILH, with the backing of lawmakers from the governing centre-left coalition Concertación por la Democracia and conservative opposition parties. ”There is a marked will in parliament to improve legislation on this issue,” said Bustos, given that acts of homophobia violate, among others, the rights to life, equality before the law, employment, education, health care, free speech and assembly. The MOVILH report will be sent to national and international human rights organisations, as well as the three levels of Chilean government, the armed forces, and security and law enforcement agencies.