In Uganda homosexuality is punishable by life imprisonment and one Ugandan man says he fled the country and sought asylum in the UK after his family discovered his relationship with another man and turned violent. He says after he fled he found out that his boyfriend was arrested and there was a warrant out for his arrest.

Abbey Kyeyune, who has been living in the Manchester since 2014, will be sent back to Uganda after the UK Home Office denied his asylum application because he had failed to sufficiently “prove” his sexuality.

The Independent reported:

He said he could not return to his family, and had no other friends that he could stay with in his native Kampala.

I can’t go back home, because my family will kill me”, Mr Kyeyune said. “I have been very happy in Manchester. I have many friends there, and I have been going to church a lot.”

The Home Office has previously claimed that a lesbian woman could not be gay because she had children, while a bisexual man has said he felt compelled to submit intimate photos of himself to help prove his case.

Updated guidance on LGBT asylum claims was recently published by the Home Office, which forbids “detailed questioning in regard to sexual practices” and requests for “sexually explicit evidence”.

However, Mr Kyeyune’s Home Office interview occurred before this new guidance was in place.

In February, the Home Office was criticised after it suggested deported gay men could live safely in Afghanistan if they “pretended to be straight”.

Source.

A Change.org petition was created to try and halt his deportation and as of one week ago an update was posted saying that he is still detained.

The petition can be found here and the update read:

Abbey has asked me to say a huge thank you to everyone who has taken the trouble to support him on his petition.

His solicitor lodged a comprehensive Further Representations document, together with some new evidence, with the Home Office yesterday and we hope that those submissions will be considered carefully and positively. We await the outcome of those considerations.

In the meantime, the experience of detention is having negative effects on Abbey as it does on all immigration detainees, and we would be grateful for any further actions you may be able to take to share and promote this petition.

Once again, our most sincere thanks for what you have already done – very possibly to save a young man’s life.

Do you think he should be allowed to stay in the UK?