From staff and wire reports

Egypt convicts five men on gay-related charges
CAIRO, Egypt—An Egyptian court convicted five men April 9 on charges of homosexual behavior and sentenced them to three years in prison, officials said.

Defense lawyer Adel Ramadan said the judge found the men guilty of the “habitual practice of debauchery,” a term used in the Egyptian legal system to denote consensual homosexual acts.

The convictions were confirmed by a judicial official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to journalists.

Homosexuality is not explicitly referred to in Egypt’s legal code, but a wide range of laws covering obscenity, prostitution and debauchery are applied to gays in this conservative country.

The five men were arrested in what human rights groups describe as a crackdown on people with the AIDS virus, using the debauchery charges as a means to prosecute them.

Four of the five men tested HIV-positive after all were forced to undergo blood tests in custody, Human Rights Watch says. The New York-based rights group issued a statement signed by more than 100 other organizations around the world condemning the prosecutions.

Ramadan, a lawyer with the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, said the five men were abused and tortured over the past several months to “extract confessions” from them.

Singapore fines cable operator
SINGAPORE—Singapore’s cable television operator has been fined for airing a commercial that showed lesbians kissing, the city-state’s media regulator said April 9.

The Media Development Authority said in a statement on its website that it has fined StarHub Cable Vision $7,200 for airing the commercial in November.

The commercial, which was to promote a song by Mandarin pop singer Olivia Yan, was aired on MTV’s Mandarin-language channel, the media regulator said.

“Within the commercial, romanticized scenes of two girls kissing were shown and it portrayed the relationship as acceptable,” the statement said. “This is in breach of the TV advertising guidelines, which disallows advertisements that condone homosexuality.”

StarHub Cable Vision expressed disappointment at the authority’s decision to impose a fine but said it would follow broadcasting rules.

Under Singapore law, gay sex is deemed “an act of gross indecency,” punishable by a maximum of two years in jail. Despite the official ban on gay sex, there have been few prosecutions.

Police in Beijing beat and shock 11 AIDS protesters
BEIJING—Police beat, shocked and detained 11 people suffering from HIV/AIDS who were trying to protest in front of China’s premier, a Beijing-based activist said April 10.

Wan Yanhai of the Aizhixing Institute said the protesters, who all contracted HIV through blood transfusions, were attacked April 5 in front of the municipal government building in Shahe, a town in Hebei province outside Beijing.

Wan said the protesters were beaten with clubs, shocked with electric prods and sprayed in the face with an unknown substance that caused them to lose consciousness. He said they were taken to a hospital and later detained.

Wan said the 11 had hoped to draw the attention of Premier Wen Jiabao, who was visiting the area. The protesters were seeking compensation from the hospital where they contracted HIV from tainted blood in the mid-1990s.

Wang Weijun, a friend of the 11, said three women were later released on condition they drop their complaint against the government and not discuss what happened to them. The remaining six men and two women had not agreed to those conditions, Wang said.

A man who answered the phone April 10 at the Shahe police department said he had no information about the incident. He refused to give his name as is standard among Chinese police officers. The hospital had no listed telephone number.

New condom factory good for rainforest and locals
SAO PAULO, Brazil—Brazil inaugurated a condom factory April 7 that officials say could help hundreds of poor Brazilian rubber tappers make a living while helping to preserve the Amazon rain forest.

The plant in the northwestern town of Xapuri will produce 100 million condoms a year, which the government will distribute for free as part of its massive anti-AIDS program, Brazil’s Health Ministry said in a statement.

The latex will be drawn from towering jungle trees in the sprawling Chico Mendes forest reserve by small-time rubber tappers who protect their trees—and thus the rain forest—to ensure their livelihood, the Health Ministry said in a statement.

The factory will benefit at least 500 families of rubber tappers and will provide about 150 jobs for the town of 15,000, the ministry said.