North Cyprus is an independent country and fighting to get international recognition since 1983. Marina Yannakoudakis from London visited Nicosia and talked to Dervis Eroglu about homosexuality.

North Cyprus is not an EU member and is not bound to European Convention on Human Rights. Yannakoudakis was in Nicosia ‘when three men were arrested on suspicion of conspiring to have a sexual intercourse against the order of nature.’

In North Cyprus section 154 criminalises gay sexual act. She said that she requested Eroglu to cancel the law related to gay sexuality and to implement a law which will protect children from abuse.

Dervis Eroglu, the President of North Cyprus promised in October, ‘The draft proposal for the repeal of the part of the Criminal Code, Chapter 154, which penalizes same sex sexual activity has been submitted to the general Assembly on 25 October 2011 by a political party, the Communal Democracy Party. This draft legislation states that not only girls and women but also boys and men can be victims of rape and sexual abuse.”

  Marina said: ‘I am pleased that Dr. Eroğlu has honoured the promise he made to me in October. She further said, ‘I am also pleased that new legislation will protect children, especially boys, from sexual abuse. The anti-gay law had left an enormous hole in the justice system allowing children to go unprotected from rape and abuse.”