More about you know where!

Since my local altercation I have been amazed how many people are booked for that holiday destination which obviously reflect an ignorance outweighed by the strength for the Euro against the pound sterling! So perhaps some background information might assist, for as we say in Scotland, folk need to "think again".
In recent years Egypt has developed an horrific record of persecuting gay people. There have been mass arrests, kangaroo courts, severe prison sentences, harassment, entrapment, death threats, allegations of torture, and it`s getting worse. How long has this been happening?Here is some background: Egypt has been deporting people who are HIV+, regardless of sexual orientation, since 1994. In 1997 a gay Egyptian couple sought asylum in Australia because they feared persecution at home. In 1999 a book entitled `Plain Bread` was taken off university reading lists because it contained passages about homosexuality that were deemed indecent. Egypt is widely regarded to have an oppressive attitude to human rights.What happened in May 2001?The watershed event was the detention of 52 men after a raid at a gay-friendly party on the River Queen boat in Cairo. The men were allegedly tortured whilst in detention and accused of devil worship by the press. 23 of the men, and one minor aged 16, were sentenced to prison terms between one and five years of hard labour. Bowing to international pressure, President Murburak quashed all of the convictions except those of the two alleged ringleaders. What`s been going on since the Queen Boat arrests?According to GayEgypt.com, the Queen Boat arrests opened up the floodgates and since then there have been numerous cases of harassment, arrests, entrapment and more allegations of the torture by the authorities of gay men. What is particularly worrying is the trend of entrapping people who use gay chat rooms; one young man was arrested and sentenced to 15 months after arranging to meet someone he met online - his `new friend` turned out to be the police and transcripts of their chats were used to prosecute him, another was arrested after his phone was bugged.Is homosexuality illegal in Egypt?Ironically, no. The minimum age for heterosexual, lesbian and gays sex is set at 18. However those who have been arrested are being tried under the religious Sharia law and are generally charged with "habitual debauchery."What now?Following the Queen River trial, several world leaders expressed their outrage about Egypt`s treatment of gay men, however, it seems to have had little effect in the long term. In April 2003 Giza Criminal Court sentenced 14 men to between one and three and a half years in prison for “habitual debauchery” because they were believed to have been gay. They were later acquitted on a technicality. GayEgypt.com has been served with repeated death threats because it has dared to report on the situation for gay people. Amnesty International are urging the Egyptian authorities to release all those imprisoned on the basis of their actual or perceived sexual orientation and implement human rights policies. Meanwhile, a campaign is growing to highlight the fact that Egypt might not be such a great holiday destination after all.