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LGBTI Rights | Updated factsheets on UN Special Procedures

ISHR and ILGA World have updated their factsheets on different UN experts – check out the references to LGBTI persons and recommendations that these Special Procedures have made.

ISHR and ILGA World have examined the work of 54 UN Special Procedures over the last eleven years to compile factsheets listing the references and recommendations made by these experts regarding LGBTI persons, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression and sex characteristics (SOGIESC).

Focusing on the Special Procedures that made the most regular and in-depth references to issues affecting LGBTI persons, the factsheets examine all thematic reports, reports arising from country visits, and communications sent to different States between January 2011 and 31 December 2021.

In 2021, Special Procedures sent 52 communications, issued 8 reports on country visits and published 54 thematic reports in relation to LGBTI topics.

The mandates that made the most regular references to SOGIESC issues were the Independent Expert on SOGI and the Special Rapporteur on freedom of expression. In welcome advances some mandates made their first communications covering LGBTI topics (the Special Rapporteur on truth, justice and reparation and the Special Rapporteur on Belarus), and the Special Rapporteur on the right to privacy included SOGIESC issues in their report of country visit for the first time.

While slightly less than 50% of all thematic reports mentioned some LGBTI related topics, the level of detail and analysis, as well as which mandates regularly reference SOGIESC issues, indicate that opportunities remain for LGBTI defenders to strengthen this work, including in relation to specific populations within LGBTI communities, such as LBQ women, trans or intersex persons, BIPOC people with diverse SOGIESC, LGBTI migrants and refugees and LGBTI persons with disabilities.

31 communications were made with the Independent Expert on SOGI, who since 2016, has played an essential role in adding to discussion of SOGI issues at the UN. According to information published on the OHCHR website, this mandate has conducted 1 country visits, sent 31 communications and prepared 2 thematic reports exclusively centered on violence and discrimination on the basis of SOGI.

Explore our fact sheets below.

Read this article to find out more about the trends seen over the last year in efforts of Special Procedures to push for better protection of the rights of LGBTI persons.

Contact: Tess McEvoy, [email protected]

Photo: Common Wikimedia Ludovic Bertron