Theresa May ‘Deeply Regrets’ UK’s Colonial Anti-gay Laws

Apologises over deportation row

British Prime Minister Theresa May has said she deeply regrets the UK’s role in criminalising same-sex relations in its former colonies, BBC reported on Tuesday.

The laws were passed under British rule and are still used in 37 of the Commonwealth’s 53 member nations.

There is a global trend towards decriminalising homosexual acts, but some countries, like Nigeria and Uganda, have imposed stricter laws.

At a Commonwealth meeting, Mrs May said laws were “wrong then and wrong now”. “Nobody should face discrimination and persecution because of who they are or who they love,” Mrs May said in London as Commonwealth leaders gather for their summit, which is held every two years.

“The UK stands ready to support any Commonwealth nation wanting to reform outdated legislation that makes such discrimination possible.

“Across the world discriminatory laws made many years ago continue to affect the lives of many people, criminalising same-sex relations and failing to protect women and girls.”

The number of states that criminalise same-sex relations is decreasing annually, with Belize and the Seychelles repealing such laws in 2016.

But in many socially conservative and religious countries in Africa, where homosexuality is a taboo, there has been resistance to calls to decriminalise same-sex relationships.

South Africa, which rejoined the Commonwealth after the end of white-minority rule in 1994, is one of the exceptions.

It has one of the most liberal constitutions in the world, which protects gay rights, and was the first African country to legalise same-sex marriage in 2006.

Also, May personally apologised to Caribbean leaders on Tuesday after her government had threatened to deport migrants to Britain in the 1950s and 1960s. At a meeting in Downing Street, AFP reported May as telling representatives of the 12 Caribbean members of the Commonwealth that she took the treatment of the so-called Windrush generation “very seriously”. “I want to apologise to you today. Because we are genuinely sorry for any anxiety that has been caused,” she told the hastily-convened gathering.

She added: “I want to dispel any impression that my government is in some sense clamping down on Commonwealth citizens, particularly those from the Caribbean.”

The government has faced outrage for its treatment of people who came to Britain between 1948, when the ship Windrush brought over the first group of West Indian immigrants, and the early 1970s.

They and their parents were invited to help rebuild Britain after World War II and with many of them legally British -- they were born while their home countries were still colonies -- they were given indefinite leave to remain.

But those who failed to get their papers in order are now being treated as illegal, which limits their access to work and healthcare and puts them at risk of deportation if they cannot provide evidence of their life in Britain.

The row, which one MP called a “national shame”, has been hugely embarrassing for the government as it coincides with this week’s meeting of the 53 Commonwealth heads of government in London.