Not So Shocking News: Iran Has Gay People

“In Iran, we do not have this phenomenon,” he said referring to homosexuality. “I do not know who has told you we have it.”

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at Columbia University.

Someone should ask Ahmadinejad how Iran can execute gays and lesbians if they have no homosexuals.

(London) In a meeting between Iranian and British parliamentarians a high ranking Iranian politician has for the first time acknowledged that the Islamic state upholds the death penalty for homosexuality according to minutes of the meeting obtained by The Times newspaper.

The disclosure came during a peace conference - the Inter-Parliamentary Union - in May.

The story gets more tragic: an estimated 4,000 gay men and women have been killed under Iran's homophobic policy. Iranian women have been to be stoned to death. None of these people received anything representing Western legal representation. Trials are a mere formality.

Pam Spaulding has thoughts on the Iranian government's recent disclosure.