New York, New York – GMHC released the following statement after a shocking story in The New York Times this week that details the exclusion of 22 nongovernmental organizations from a United Nations global meeting to stop the AIDS epidemic.
The New York Times reported that “Russia, Cameroon, Tanzania, and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, a 57-nation bloc, objected to the participation of 22 nongovernmental organizations, or N.G.O.s. Their initial list included 39 groups. Lobbying by the president of the General Assembly, Mogens Lykketoft, a Danish diplomat, trimmed it to 22.”
STATEMENT BY GMHC CEO KELSEY LOUIE:
By preventing nearly two dozen organizations from participating in the United Nations global meeting to stop the AIDS epidemic, the General Assembly is stifling essential voices from a critical conversation.Blocking groups that work with the lesbian, gay and transgender communities, as well as groups representing drug users, works against the goal of getting to zero new AIDS cases. If we have learned one thing in the past 35 years, it is that we must act together to defeat this epidemic. Gay Men’s Health Crisis does not support the discrimination and prejudice behind this decision, and urges the General Assembly to allow all voices into the meeting.