Burkina Faso issues first sentence for 'homosexuality and related practices'

Burkina Faso has issued its first known conviction for homosexuality since banning same-sex sexual relations earlier this year.

An individual identified as K.M. was charged with sentenced to 24 months’ imprisonment, a fine of 2,000,000 CFA francs (approximately $3,581), and ordered expelled from the country following completion of the sentence, the African Human Rights Coalition has confirmed. The official charges were "homosexuality and related practices."

Related: Burkina Faso bans homosexuality, levying fines and up to 5 years in prison

"AHRC expresses grave concern over this conviction, particularly given the sweeping and vague language of the new law, its application against a vulnerable foreign national, and the penal severity including post-sentence expulsion," the organization said in a statement. "This represents the first known enforcement of the 2025 criminalization statute and marks a significant escalation in the legal persecution of LGBTQI+ people in Burkina Faso."

Burkina Faso's military junta voted in September to ban consensual same-sex sexual relations, with the bill earning the support of 71 unelected members of the junta parliament, as well as President Ibrahim Traoré, a former army captain who seized power after two coups in 2022. The law levies punishment of up to five years in prison and significant fines.

While LGBTQ+ identities are not widely accepted in the nation, they were not previously outlawed. The ban comes as part of the junta's overhaul of marriage laws after usurping power from the country's former military ruler, Lt. Col. Paul-Henri Damiba. Human Rights Watch has previously said the 2022 military coup in Burkina Faso was "responsible for serious abuses, further degrading [the country's] human rights and humanitarian situation."

Related: Activists Link U.S. Nonprofit to Anti-LGBTQ+ Laws Across Africa

Over five dozen countries have laws making same-sex sexual relations illegal. Most of them are in Africa, with the majority inheriting their laws from European colonization. Those colonial laws remain in place even after the countries that implemented them overturned them, though they're not always actively enforced. Punishments range from fines and imprisonment to the death penalty.

While many countries have decriminalized same-sex relationships in recent years, others have instead enacted legislation where there previously was none criminalizing them. Uganda lawmakers passed what has been dubbed one of the world's harshest anti-LGBTQ+ laws in 2023, and Ghana advanced a draconian LGBTQ+ criminalization bill in spite of warnings from other nations and world financial institutions.