Gay men filmed in knife attack as attackers try to drag them into the street naked
A video has surfaced of two gay men in Morocco being assaulted by several people.
The video, apparently shot with a camera phone, shows the two men, naked, with bloody faces covered only with a sheet.
The attackers attempt in the video to remove the sheet, and to drag them out into the street.
Local media reports that the exact location of the attack is unknown, but it is thought that the gay men were attacked with knives by a group.
According to the LGBT group Akaliyat, the men were attacked at their home by five individuals residing in the same neighbourhood.”
The group added that the attackers recorded the video as they carried out the assault, before publishing it across social networks.
Akaliyat said the video showed the “insecurity” faced by LGBT people in Moroccan cities.
It released a statement saying the video “reflected the proliferation of serious attacks against homosexuals”.
Activists called on authorities to look into the attack by opening an investigation.
They also urged the Government to decriminalise homosexuality in order to remove the stigma associated with being LGBT.
Last month, two Moroccan men were arrested after a video of them kissing caused outrage online.
Earlier this year, two Moroccan youths were jailed for one and a half years and fined 2,000 dirhams (£375) each on charges of homosexuality.
Moroccan law penalises acts of “sexual deviancy” between members of the same sex – a term that police reports and court documents use to refer to homosexuality more generally.
Gay sex is punishable by up to three years imprisonment and a fine.
Last year, campaigners condemned the jailing of two men accused of consensual same-sex activity in Morocco.
In May, three men in Morocco accused of homosexuality were jailed for three years each.
Ray Cole, a gay British man, was briefly jailed in the country in 2014 under Morocco’s anti-gay laws.
Mr Cole and his Moroccan friend were subsequently released following a high-profile campaign.
