36 Sri Lanka gay activists die in tsunami disaster
Thirty-six members of the Sri Lankan gay organisation Companions on a Journey (www.companions-lanka.org) died in the December 26 tsunami disaster that has so far claimed some 150,000 lives in 11 countries including India, Indonesia and Thailand. Twelve additional members of the group remain unaccounted for while 112 of the group's members had their homes destroyed by the waves.

In a Rex Wockner media report, Sherman de Rose, the group's executive director was quoted as saying: "The coastal line which the tourists frequent is destroyed entirely. So, along with it, whatever the gay-friendly places were, were destroyed as well. Mind you, we didn't have any out and open gay/lesbian spaces, although it was accepted in tourist areas where a lot of LGB tourists from Western Europe and Scandinavian countries visit for holidays. Fortunately for the gay community," de Rose said, "the tsunami didn't make its appearance in the evening; otherwise lots of gays cruising along the beaches would have perished."

The executive director of the Sri Lankan "LGBTIQ" organisation Equal Ground (www.equal-ground.org), Rosanna Flamer-Caldera, reported "many of the gay 'spaces' in the south and also in Negombo to the north of Colombo were damaged or wiped out by the tsunami. This horrible, horrible disaster has knocked Sri Lanka so bad that it will take years and years to rebuild." More than 30,000 people along Sri Lanka's southern, eastern and northern shores have died while more than 5,000 are still missing.

In Thailand, the resort town of Phuket, which is popular with gay tourists, was hard hit. Ulf Mikaelsson, a Swede who runs the Connect Guest House and Coffee Bar with his partner, B�rje Carlsson, said most of the gay businesses are "far enough from the beach to be untouched by the tragedy." In an email, he said that the Phuket gay community is busy raising funds for those Thais and foreigners who suffered injury and loss due to the tidal waves and urged would-be visitors not to cancel their trips.

Phuket's death toll was 262 with 105 foreigners, 154 Thais and three unclassified while 700 are missing. Thailand's confirmed death toll in the tsunami disaster is more than 5,200, of whom about half are foreign holidaymakers, with almost 4,500 people missing, the interior ministry said on Wednesday. The hardest hit province of Phang Nga, where the devastated beach resort of Khao Lak is located, had 4,134 confirmed dead.

In Indonesia, it is not known if gay communities have been affected. "We don't know about the effect of the tsunami on gay people in Aceh and North Sumatra," said D�d� Oetomo, head of GAYa NUSANTARA. "We never had any organised contact in Aceh or the island of Nias in North Sumatra, which have been hardest-hit. "Medan, the major city on the eastern coast with a sizeable gay population, was spared due to its distance from the epicenter," Oetomo said. Medan is the nearest big city to Aceh province, where nearly all of the deaths have occurred. The death toll for Indonesia is reported to be 94,000 while the health ministry said on January 5 that the number of people living in displaced persons' camps had risen to 474,619, up from its previous tally of 387,607.

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Nepal to launch first gay weekly
Nepal will see its first gay weekly on newsstands and distributed free to grassroots organisations and schools in the third week of January, reported The Hindustan Times. Launched by Blue Diamond Society, a sexual minority and HIV/AIDS advocacy NGO that was founded in 2001 by Nepalese gay rights activist Sunil Panta and funded by the British embassy, the eight-page Blue Diamond Weekly in English and Nepalese aims to sensitise locals about the gay community. The magazine is expected to contain personal stories and an agony aunt column and some of the staple columns of non-specialised magazines like recipes and beauty tips.

The Blue Diamond Society complains that its members are rounded up by police and beaten up. It is currently facing a case filed last year by a local lawyer, who wants the government to shut it down. Achyut Prasad Kharal filed a public interest petition in the Supreme Court against the Government and the Home Ministry, accusing them of abetting immoral activities by permitting the society to function. The suit is to be heard on January 18, just days before the first copies of the gay weekly roll out.

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Gay slights may land Aussie media personalities in court
Australian media personalities John Laws and Sam Newman may face legal action in Tasmania over comments alleged to have incited hatred against gay people. The complaint was filed by gay activist Michael Dempsey on January 5 with the state's anti-discrimination commission, who claimed that both men made comments last year which breached Tasmania's Anti-Discrimination Act.

Laws's comments were made on his morning radio program on November 3 when the entertainer spoke about Carson Kressley of the Queer Eye for the Straight Guy TV show, who was in Australia at the time. He described Kressley as a "pompous little pansy prig" and a "pillow-biter" and went on to play a recorded track featuring the line 'piss off pansy.' The comments were broadcast on radio station 2UE and syndicated on several radio stations in Tasmania. He has since taken out an advertisement in Sydney's gay papers apologising for his comments.

Newman's comments were made live on Channel Nine's Today Show on November 29 and broadcast in Tasmania via WIN TV. When responding to a proposal to make Melbourne more attractive to gay and lesbian visitors, he labelled gay people as "lisping, parading people wandering all over the country, all over the state adding absolutely nothing to it."

"If we get one victory as happened in Sydney, then that is certainly a win and sends a very clear message to broadcasters and commentators that these comments are unreasonable and not appropriate in this country in the 21st century. This is about vilification and protecting vulnerable members of the community, not a person's right to express an opinion," Dempsey said.

Rodney Croome of the Tasmanian Gay and Lesbian Rights Group said the complaint would send a strong message that slurs, abuse and hateful speech against sexual minorities were equal to discrimination against racial minorities.

Calif. gay couples to get marriage-like benefits
California granted sweeping marriage-like rights to thousands of gay and lesbian couples January 1, greatly expanding the state's 5-year-old experiment with domestic partnerships. The new laws will allow same-sex couples access to divorce court for dividing their assets, seeking alimony and securing child support as well as automatic parental status over children born during the relationship and responsibility for each other's debts.

The landmark legislation is set to reignite a fiery national battle over homosexual unions as two anti-gay rights groups have challenged the law, claiming it violates the intent of a 2000 ballot initiative approved by voters that holds only unions between a man and a woman as valid in the state. The California Court of Appeal has agreed to hear the case early in the year.

Same-sex couples affected by the law vastly outnumber those covered by Vermont's system of civil unions or those who have wed in Massachusetts, the only state that allows gay marriages. Some 29,000 couples - the majority same-sex partners - are expected to be affected by the new laws.

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