200808302041 | Gays banged up for 'Homosexual marriage and Acts against nature.'

Gays banged up for 'Homosexual marriage and Acts against nature.'

Dakar - Senegal has jailed a Belgian and his male Senegalese domestic helper for two years for "homosexual marriage and acts against nature", their lawyer said on Thursday. Richard Lambot, 61, and Moustapha Gueye, 63, who wedded in Belgium - where civil gay marriage is legal - last month, were sentenced by the Dakar regional court on Augusut 21, said lawyer Seyni Ndione.

"To help Moustapha Gueye get papers to live in Belgium, Richard Lambot married him in July," Ndione said, after which they returned to Senegal - a predominantly Muslim nation where homosexuality is frowned upon as an act against nature.

"This marriage was only intended to help Mr Gueye," the lawyer said, adding that a poorly conducted police investigation led the two to be accused of "acts against nature" at Lambot's home in a working-class part of Dakar.

Homosexuality in Senegal can lead to five years in prison and fines running up to 1.5 million CFA francs.

In February, five people were detained for several days, then freed without charge, after a symbolic wedding between two men near Dakar.