PATHOLIZATION/ VICTIMIZATION

1. Discriminatory laws and practices, including pathologization, can

legitimize such violence and create a climate in which perpetrators
go unpunished.

2. When lodging complaints of violence by third parties, LGBT people

have reportedly been subject to further victimization by the police,
including verbal, physical and sexual assault, including rape

3. Silencing through shame or threat by law enforcement officials may

keep a considerable number of victims from reporting abuses. Laws on
sexual violence that only consider women victims, or that restrict
the definition of sexual violence only to penile penetration, can
leave survivors of other forms of sexual violence, as well as victims
who are not women or who are not legally recognized as women, with no
access to recourse.

4. “[s]ince homosexuality is not a medical condition, any purported

medical test applied to determine an applicant’s sexual orientation
could not, in my view, be considered to be consistent with [the right
to the integrity of the person]. It would also fail the
proportionality requirement […] in relation to a violation of the
right to privacy and family life because, by definition, such a test
cannot achieve the objective of establishing an individual’s sexual
orientation. It follows that medical tests cannot be used for the
purpose of establishing an applicant’s credibility, as they infringe
Articles 3 [the right to the integrity of the person] and 7 [the
right to respect for private and family life] of the Charter [of
Fundamental Rights of the European Union]

5. Reports of the Special Rapporteur on Torture (A/HRC/22/53), 2013,

paras. 76, 79

The practice of subjecting cisgender men and transgender women who

are arrested on homosexuality-related charges to anal examinations
that are intended to obtain physical evidence for prosecution has
been condemned by the Committee against Torture, the Working Group on
Arbitrary Detention, and the Special Rapporteur on torture, who has
also criticized it as “medically worthless”.

The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) has concluded that

homophobic illtreatment on the part of health professionals is
unacceptable and should be proscribed and denounced.103 There is an
abundance of accounts and testimonies of persons being denied medical
treatment, subjected to verbal abuse and public humiliation,
psychiatric evaluation, a variety of forced procedures such as
sterilization, State-sponsored forcible anal examinations for the
prosecution of suspected homosexual activities, and invasive
virginity examinations conducted by health-care providers,104 hormone
therapy and genital normalizing surgeries under the guise of so
called “reparative therapies”. 105 These procedures are rarely
medically necessary,106 can cause scarring, loss of sexual sensation,
pain, incontinence and lifelong depression and have also been
criticized as being unscientific, potentially harmful and
contributing to stigma (A/HRC/14/20, para. 23). The Committee on the
Elimination of Discrimination against Women expressed concern about
lesbian, bisexual, transgender and intersex women as “victims of
abuses and mistreatment by health service providers”

6. Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, General Comment

No. 22 (E/C.12/GC/22), 2016, para. 58; Report of the Independent
Expert on protection against violence and discrimination based on
sexual orientation and gender identity (A/73/152), para. 28; Report
of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights on
discrimination and violence based on sexual orientation and gender
identity (A/HRC/29/23), 2015, para. 70; Human Rights Committee,
Concluding Observations on Ukraine (CCPR/C/UKR/CO/7), para. 10;
Report of the Special Rapporteur on torture (A/HRC/22/53), 2013,
para. 88; and the joint statement by OHCHR, UN-Women, UNAIDS, UNDP,
UNFPA, UNICEF and WHO, “Eliminating forced, coercive and otherwise
involuntary sterilization”, 2014

Transgender people are often forced or coerced to undergo

sterilization, gender reassignment surgery, other medical procedures
and medical certification in violation of international human rights
standards, including as abusive requirements for recognition of
gender identity.

7. The Committee against Torture and the Special Rapporteur on

torture have expressed concern about forced treatment to change
sexual orientation or gender identity, including through involuntary
confinement in psychiatric and other institutions, the administration
of electroshocks, and other “aversion therapy”, which could result
in physical and psychological harm.

8.Conversion therapies and surgeries

The aim of the provisions of article 7 of the International Covenant

on Civil and Political Rights is to protect both the dignity and the
physical and mental integrity of the individual. It is the duty of
the State party to afford everyone protection through legislative and
other measures as may be necessary against the acts prohibited by
article 7, whether inflicted by people acting in their official
capacity, outside their official capacity or in a private capacity.
The prohibition in article 7 is complemented by the positive
requirements of article 10, paragraph 1, of the Covenant, which
stipulates that “All persons deprived of their liberty shall be
treated with humanity and with respect for the inherent dignity of
the human person.”

The Committee also reaffirms that, even in situations of public

emergency such as those referred to in article 4 of the Covenant, no
derogation from the provision of article 7 is allowed and its
provisions must remain in force

Article 7 expressly prohibits medical or scientific experimentation

without the free consent of the person concerned.