Country Overview
Eritrea
At a glance
Same-sex Relations for Men Legal Throughout the Country?
Same-sex Relations for Women Legal Throughout the Country?
Legal Gender Recognition Possible?
LGBTI Orgs Able to Register?
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Same-sex sexual activity is prohibited under Penal Code 2015, which criminalizes “ homosexual conduct” in Eritrea. There’s a maximum penalty of seven years imprisonment, and both men and women are criminalized under this law. The law was inherited during Ethiopian rule through the 1957 Penal Code. Eritrea’s first Penal Code since independence, adopted in 2015, maintained the criminalizing provision with an enhanced sentence. A US Department of State report noted that the government “actively enforced this law.”
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