SWEDEN TO PAY TRANSSEXUALS FORCED INTO STERILIZATION
STOCKHOLM— Sweden is planning to pay compensation to transsexuals who were forced to undergo sterilization during the sex change procedure, the health minister said on Saturday.
The government is to introduce a bill which would award $26,000 to every person who was legally compelled to accept sterilization in order to complete a sex change, Health Minister Gabriel Wikstrom told the Dagens Nyheter daily.
Between 1972 and 2013, the law made sterilization obligatory for transsexuals who wanted their sex change to be officially recognized by the authorities.
But in December 2012, a Swedish court ruled that the practice was unconstitutional and violated the European Convention on Human Rights, with a ban coming into force a month later.
“The demand for sterilization which existed previously laid out a vision from which today’s society wishes to distance itself and the government believes it was wrong to demand it,” Wikstrom said.
The move to change the law was hailed as a world first by the Swedish Federation for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Rights (RFSL).
But the group said it would push for a higher level of compensation.
“The sum should be at a
The government believes it was wrong to demand it Gabriel Wikstrom Swedish health minister
level which constitutes a real recognition of the excesses of the state,” said RFSL president Frida Sandegard.
In 2013, nearly 150 Swedish transsexuals demanded an official apology from the state and compensation worth around 5 million euros—about 34,000 per person.
RFSL said the practice had affected some 800 people.
Until now, the government has refused to acknowledge mistakes, despite the fact that in 1999, Sweden had previously paid compensation of more than 20,000 euros to 230,000 victims of forced sterilization under a eugenics program in force between 1935 and 1996.
Official statistics showed that between 1972 and 2011, 865 people asked to legally change their gender, with 500 of them actually going ahead.