US President Donald Trump‘s administration plans to launch a global campaign to end the criminalisation of homosexuality in dozens of countries where it’s still illegal.
US Ambassador to Germany and the highest profile gay official in the Trump administration, Richard Grenell, will lead the effort.
It’s unclear what the genesis of the strategy but reports suggest it was partly conceived as a response to the reported execution of a young gay man in Iran, a country that remains a top geopolitical foe of the Trump administration.
The campaign will therefore be narrowly focused on criminalization rather than broader Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Questioning, Queer (LGBTQQ) concerns around marriage as one example.
Officials say the administration will likely work with global organisations like the United Nations, the European Union and other like-minded countries and organisations whose laws already allow for gay rights.
The campaign will likely also place close Trump allies in the spotlight, particularly in the Middle East.
Homosexuality is also punishable by death in Saudi Arabia – a key ally of a Trump administration that has sought to defend, Riyadh admits, credible claims that the Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman was involved in the murder of a top journalist in Turkey.
