In 2007, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stated that homosexuality is a “despicable act … dirty and harmful to humanity” and declared, “In Iran, we don’t have homosexuals.” In 2012, The Guardian reported that an influential Iranian cleric had referred to homosexuals as inferior to dogs and pigs.

The number of gay Iranian men executed for homosexuality appears to have risen sharply in recent years. The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office has expressed concern that LGBTI men and women are frequently charged with other crimes such as rape, fraud, or robbery in order to justify their execution.

In 2011, The United Nations Human Rights Committee raised its concern for members of the LGBTI community in Iran who face ‘harassment, persecution, cruel punishment and even the death penalty’. It is also noted that these persons are discriminated against in terms of access to employment, housing, education and health care, as well as social exclusion within the community.

Human rights organisations have shown how LGBTI persons are routinely harassed by the state and society at large, with a 2012 study demonstrating how the use of Internet by LGBTI Iranians is a rare, yet dangerous, opportunity to express one’s LGBTI identity and build a sense of community.

Human Rights Watch documented how many Iranian families view homosexuality in their children as an illness and take them to psychologists to be ‘cured’. Transgender persons are encouraged by the state to seek medical help in the form of gender-reassignment surgery. Sex changes have been legal in Iran for nearly 30 years, with the government providing up to half the cost of the operation for those with limited financial resources. This is seen as helping trans-gender persons to align themselves with the natural societal order.

Supreme Administrative Court, 13 January 2012, KHO:2012:1, Finland.
Asylum applicant fled Iran following his sentencing for homosexuality and ultimately gained status in Finland.

HJ (Iran) and HT (Cameroon) v. Secretary of State for the Home Department
The Supreme Court of the UK eliminated the so-called ‘discretion’ for applicants claiming asylum from persecution on the basis of sexuality. For a return of someone who has a well-founded fear of persecution on the basis of sexuality, the new test essentially requires a finding that the applicant would choose to live discreetly as a matter of personal preference, rather than as a function of fear for social or formal punishment or violence.

XY (Iran) v. Secretary of State for the Home Department, [2008] EWCA Civ 911, United Kingdom: Court of Appeal (England and Wales), 31 July 2008
This UK case, prior to the elimination of the discretion test in HJ and HT, concerns the rejection of an asylum application based on the expectation of discretion in sexual relationships.

HS (Homosexuals: Minors, Risk on Return) Iran v. Secretary of State for the Home Department, [2005] UKAIT 00120, United Kingdom
Successful appeal of removal decision for Iranian gay man in the UK during ‘discretion test’ era.