INTERNATIONAL NEWS
Compiled by Peter Carlyle-Gordge
Gay judge wins custody of kids
Nookie spotted through porthole
SANTIAGO, CHILE » A gay judge has
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC » Two men from California have
won a custody case
pleaded guilty to charges of breaking Dominica’s anti-gay laws after
against the Chilean
being seen having sex on a gay cruise ship. AP reports that the
courts which had
men, who were on a Caribbean gay cruise when they were spotted
taken away her three
having sex on the ship by someone on the island of Dominica,
daughters in 2004
were fined $900. The Palm Springs couple were aboard the Atlantis
believing her sexuality
Events-chartered Celebrity Summit ship, which sailed on to St Barts
put their development “at risk”. As the Inter-American Court of Human Rights is the ultimate adjudicator for
without them after their arrest.
NEPALBUNJ, NEPAL » Nepal’s first openly gay MP
the Americas, deciding cases in accordance with the
Pope disses gay marriage
has secured the opening of the country’s first gender-
American Convention on Human Rights, it marks the end
neutral washroom. The public convenience, paid for by a
VATICAN CITY » Pope Benedict has again denounced the
of eight years of legal battles for Karen Atala. The Court
Parliamentary Development Fund, opened in the western city
“powerful political and cultural currents” seeking to legalize gay
criticised the decision by Chile’s Supreme Court
of Nepalgunj under the auspices of Sunil Pant. “I decided to
marriage in the United States, where Maryland has just become
to uphold an order removing Atala’s children from
use part of my parliamentary development fund to build the
her and giving their father custody because of
toilet that is “for all”, not just for men and women,” said Pant.
Atala’s sexual orientation. Chile’s supreme
“Toilets and places for praying are simultaneously private
court had ruled that the girls were in a
and public places, but for those people who don’t identify as
said the traditional family and marriage
“position of risk” and could have
male or female, accessing these places might mean that they
had to be “defended from every possible
harm done to their “psychic
have to reveal an intimately private aspect of their lives to
misrepresentation of their true nature”
development” by living with the
strangers and authorities.”
because, he said, whatever injured
judge and her female partner.
families also injured society.
the eighth state to allow it. The pope’s latest comments came in an address to bishops from several Midwestern states on a regular visit to the Vatican. He
I AM A TRAI