LGBT+ community increasingly exposed to violence in Tunisia
LGBT+ people are increasingly exposed to violence and injustice, according to a newly-released report, in the latest crackdown on human rights in Tunisia.
Reported by RFI on March 17th, the Tunisian Association “Intersections”, has published a report detailing twelve testimonials which publicly demonstrate the difficulties of being LGBT+ in Tunisia.
In a country where homosexuality is criminalized by law, researcher Hazem Chikhaoui said, “justice is completely absent… there is no way to guarantee their existence, to protect them, or to guarantee a minimum of security or access to care.”
The report follows a recent crackdown by security forces on the LGBT+ community with a wave of 84 arrests between December 2024 and January 2025 of people based on their sexual orientation or gender identity. The testimonies provide evidence that repression has intensified in recent months.
According to Amnesty International, social media platforms were flooded with homophobic and transphobic inflammatory hate speech, further fuelled by mainstream media adopting the same rhetoric. Since, LGBT+ organizations and charities have been under constant threat with many calling for their dissolution and arrest of activists.
Amnesty also said the criminalization of same-sex relationships exposes LGBT+ people to violence and abuse by police, who often exploit their fear of arrest through blackmail, extortion or, sometimes, sexual abuse.
In 2017, the Tunisian government committed to banning forced anal examinations which were used on suspected homosexuals as means of proving their sexual orientation. The authorities could no longer impose the exams by “force, physical or moral, or without the consent of the person concerned,” according to former Minister Mehdi Ben Gharbia.
However, recent testimonials and evidence from Tunisian charities suggests this commitment was never met by the Tunisian government and those arrested under charges of sodomy continue to be subjected to forced anal examinations, a practice many consider sexual abuse.
This report therefore confirms for many that the Tunisian government have not followed through on their commitment to stopping forced anal examinations and there continues to be an increasing level of violence directed towards the LGBT+ community in recent months.
However, Tunisian civic society are not united regarding their position on the decriminalization of homosexuality and so it is unlikely there will be major internal backlash over the increasing exposure of violence felt by the LGBT+ community. This seems even more unlikely following the increasing crackdowns by government forces on civic spaces as Tunisia has received international attention in recent months for the brutality of the treatment against political opposition.
RFI, Amnesty International, The New Arab, Maghrebi
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