**Transgender activists in Guatemala City “Human Rights Are Not Negotiable”**

Helping Transgender Women in Central America

For more than a decade, RWF has supported OTRANS — La Organizatión Trans Reinas de La Noche (Organization of the Trans Queens of the Night) — a Guatemalan non-profit fighting to free the transgender communities of Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras from stigma, discrimination, and violence.

RWF was first introduced to OTRANS during a humanitarian visit to Guatemala in 2008. Since then, we have provided important financial support for transgender safety and health care, HIV/AIDS prevention programs, and micro-credit programs. Our support has helped establish a network of small refuges of a few rooms each. These are often used as safe houses for trans people who have attempted to escape life-threatening violence by fleeing to Mexico or the United States, but who along the way were forced to return to their homelands and to the very dangers they sought to escape.

There are no legal protections for LGBTQ+ people in Guatemala. Trans leaders risk their lives by being visible and active, fighting to raise awareness and acceptance of the trans community, and advocating for better trans medical treatment. Under any circumstances, this is a difficult mission. But it is made all the harder in a country like Guatemala that continues to struggle with high rates of poverty, crime, drug trafficking, and instability.

Help transgender women in Guatemala achieve hope, safety, and dignity - please donation today!

**Guatemalan transgender activists Andrea Mutz Gonzáles and Cecy Caricia Ixpata were murdered in June 2021. A Guatemalan gay man was also murder during the same week.**

LGBTQ+ Rights in Guatemala

LGBTQ+ persons in Guatemala face legal challenges not experienced by non-LGBTQ+ residents. Both male and female same-sex sexual activity are legal in Guatemala.

Sexual orientation and gender identity are not expressly included in the country's non-discrimination laws and same-sex couples and households headed by same-sex couples are not eligible for the same legal protections available to opposite-sex married couples. A majority of Guatemalans affiliate with the Catholic Church or Protestant churches. As such, attitudes towards members of the LGBTQ+ community tend to reflect prevailing religious mores. Nevertheless, LGBTQ+ people have slowly gained more and more visibility and acceptance in recent years, in line with worldwide trends. Additionally, Guatemala is legally bound to the January 2018 Inter-American Court of Human Rights ruling, which held that same-sex marriage and the recognition of one's gender identity on official documents are human rights protected by the American Convention on Human Rights.

There is no legal recognition for same-sex couples in the form of same-sex marriages or in the more limited form of civil unions or domestic partnership arrangements. On March 9, 2022, the Guatemalan Congress approved Law 5272, which would ban same-sex marriage, and in turn would penalize abortion with 5 years in prison. Given the opposition generated by President Alejandro Giammattei to enact said law, announcing that it would veto it considering that it violated the Constitution and international agreements signed by Guatemala, the project was finally archived and discarded by Congress on March 15.

Guatemala laws do not prohibit discrimination based sexual orientation or gender identity in areas such as employment, education, housing, health care, banking or other public accommodations, such as cafes, restaurants, nightclubs and cinemas