Bernard Randall, a British man deported from Uganda after being found with a gay-sex video, has decried Britain’s failure to take decisive action against the east African country’s increasingly homophobic government.
The 65-year-old, who is battling to get his partner, Albert Cheptoyek, out of the country, where he faces up to seven years in jail on indecency charges, said that other countries had sent strong messages to Uganda over its persecution of gay people, but Britain needed to be “much more aggressive.”
Randall, from Conyer, Kent, on England’s south coast, was charged with “trafficking obscene material” last year after robbers stole a laptop containing images of him having sex with a man in Morocco. The images were subsequently published by Ugandan newspaper Red Pepper and the couple were arrested, though charges against Randall were dropped on condition that he was deported back to Britain.
Photo: AFP
Fears over Cheptoyek’s safety have intensified after Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni last week signed into law a bill that imposes life sentences for acts of “aggravated homosexuality.”
The bill strengthens already strict legislation outlawing homosexual acts in the country and criminalizes the “promotion of homosexuality.”
Museveni’s decision provoked international condemnation.
US Secretary of State John Kerry condemned the law as “atrocious,” while South African Nobel peace laureate Desmond Tutu compared it to antisemitic laws in Nazi Germany or persecution in apartheid South Africa.
Donors, such as Denmark and Norway, have announced that they will redirect aid away from the Ugandan government to aid agencies. On Friday, the World Bank said that it had postponed a loan to Uganda because of its anti-gay law.
Randall said the reaction of the British government was mealy-mouthed by comparison.
“We need a much more aggressive line. Look at what Norway, Denmark and Holland [Netherlands] have done. Even the noises the Americans have made,” he said from the home he hopes one day to share with Cheptoyek.
He points to an e-mail from the British High Commission in Kampala that arrived last week in response to Randall’s growing concern for Cheptoyek’s safety.
“The UK, along with our international partners, will continue to press the government of Uganda to defend human rights for all, without discrimination on any grounds. The UK is in close contact with Ugandan civil society groups and will continue to support their efforts to improve human rights in Uganda,” the e-mail said.
It adds that British Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Mark Simmonds has raised the issue of the bill several times with the Ugandan government, but Randall believes that officials should also directly raise Cheptoyek’s case.
“Albert is so worried for his safety. There is a lot of very frightened people at the moment. He is very, very worried and living under a lot of pressure,” said Randall, a retired computer analyst. “It would be great to have the Foreign Office on the case with the Ugandan authorities, saying that we are watching it.”
Shortly after the men’s arrest, two Red Pepper reporters visited the police station where they were being held and, Randall alleges, Cheptoyek was photographed on the floor after having his legs kicked away and being hit around the head by police.
One image of Randall’s anti-cholesterol medication appeared in the tabloid with the description: “Some of the drugs that the sodomizers depend on.”
Randall also detailed some of the ways in which he and Cheptoyek were humiliated after their arrest.
“A police surgeon looked closely at our private parts, and stuck a finger up our bums without any screens and a CID officer watching. They seemed to think that a digital rectal examination would tell them whether you’ve been sodomized or not,” he said.
Randall met Cheptoyek in Entebbe on Jan. 5 last year.
“The attraction was instant — it was love at first sight,” said Randall, whose wife died in 2011 after a long battle with ovarian cancer. “I knew that I was gay as a teenager, but 50 years ago it was a completely different world. Gays were portrayed in a very negative way, whereas now there is much more positive coverage.”
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in