Country Overview
Somalia
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 intimacy is prohibited in Somalia. "Carnal intercourse with a person of the same sex" is punishable with up to three years of imprisonment under the 1964 Penal Code. In 2012, the Provisional Constitution of Somalia affirmed the primacy of Shariah in the country, in which same-sex intimacy is punishable by death.
In parts of rural southern and central Somalia controlled by the militant Islamic group Al-Shabaab, a strict interpretation of Shariah is enforced. According to media reports, at least three people were subjected to extrajudicial executions for engaging in same-sex sexual acts in 2013 and 2017, and a young lesbian woman fled the country in 2016 after being told that she risked being executed.
In the unrecognized nation of Somaliland, which seceded from Somalia in 1991, courts also enforce Shariah, and homosexuality charges are reportedly frequent in some courts. In March 2023, a Somaliland parliamentary committee claimed that 40 people were being held in prison for homosexuality, with 36 in pre-trial detention, and four convicted and sentenced, compared to 28 people arrested on homosexuality charges in 2022.
Trans people cannot change their legal gender markers in Somalia. Intersex infants and children are not protected from non-consensual medical interventions. Somali LGBTIQ groups exist in the country or in exile, but they experience barriers to freely operating and registering as such due to the criminalization of same-sex intimacy and hostility toward LGBTIQ people in the country.
*Outright research indicates that the bodily autonomy of intersex people is not respected and protected in this country.
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