{"id":15154,"date":"2026-11-11T15:31:06","date_gmt":"2026-11-11T15:31:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/2026\/11\/11\/court-overturns-gay-sex-ban-in-trinidad-and-tobago\/"},"modified":"2026-11-11T15:31:06","modified_gmt":"2026-11-11T15:31:06","slug":"court-overturns-gay-sex-ban-in-trinidad-and-tobago","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/2026\/11\/11\/court-overturns-gay-sex-ban-in-trinidad-and-tobago\/","title":{"rendered":"Court overturns gay sex ban in Trinidad and Tobago"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The highest court of appeal for Trinidad and Tobago struck down a long-running law that criminalized gay sex in the island nation, a landmark ruling for LGBTQ rights in\u00a0the Caribbean.\n<\/p>\n

The UK-based Judicial Committee of the Privy Council \u2014 the final court of appeal for British dependencies and overseas territories \u2014 issued\u00a0a unanimous decision Tuesday that the 1986 Sexual Offences Act could not be used to prosecute private, consensual sexual relations between adults of the same sex.\n<\/p>\n

The law had previously carried sentences of two years for \u201cserious indecency\u201d and five years for \u201cbuggery.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

The decade-long legal battle to strike down the law was driven by LGBTQ Trinidadian activist Jason Jones, who said the ruling validated his campaign.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I\u2019m going to be doing in the coming months is very targeted activism about how the Caribbean, not just Trinidad and Tobago, deals with endemic homophobia,\u201d Jones told AFP after the verdict was read. <\/p>\n

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Related News<\/header>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

The court said constitutional rights must be interpreted in a way that makes them \u201cpractical and effective in the present day, not in the past.\u201d<\/p>\n

Freedom Law Chambers, the law firm that represented Jones, said in a statement that the judgement represented a \u201cphenomenal victory for gay rights, equal dignity and respect for private and family life in Trinidad and Tobago.\u201d<\/p>\n

UN Human Rights chief Volker Turk welcomed the judgment in a statement, calling it a significant milestone for rights and equality.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cI hope the judgment will help remove a longstanding source of stigma, exclusion, barriers and violence experienced by Trinidadians and Tobagonians based on sexual orientation and gender identity,\u201d Turk said.\n<\/p>\n

AFP\n <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Source: <\/p>\n

Punch Newspapers – Latest News<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The highest court of appeal for Trinidad and Tobago struck down a long-running law that criminalized gay sex in the island nation, a landmark ruling for LGBTQ rights in\u00a0the Caribbean.… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15155,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15154","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15154","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15154"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15154\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15155"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15154"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15154"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15154"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}