Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Armenia face legal and social challenges not experienced by non-LGBT residents, due in part to the lack of laws prohibiting discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity and in part to prevailing negative attitudes about LGBT persons throughout society.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Kazakhstan face significant challenges not experienced by non-LGBTQ residents. Both male and female kinds of same-sex sexual activity are legal in Kazakhstan, but same-sex couples and households headed by same-sex couples are not eligible for the same legal protections available to opposite-sex married couples.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Trinidad and Tobago face legal challenges not experienced by non-LGBTQ residents. Households headed by same-sex couples are not eligible for the same rights and benefits as that of opposite-sex couples.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Dominica face legal challenges not experienced by non-LGBTQ residents. Homosexuality has been legal since 2024, when the High Court struck down the country's colonial-era sodomy law. Dominica provides no recognition to same-sex unions, whether in the form of marriage or civil unions, and no law prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Guyana face legal and societal challenges not experienced by non-LGBTQ residents. Guyana is the only country in South America, and the only mainland country in the Americas, where homosexual acts, including anal sex and oral sex, are illegal. Cross-dressing was illegal until November 2018, when the statute was struck down by the Caribbean Court of Justice, the court of last resort of Guyana.
A sodomy law is a law that defines certain sexual acts as crimes. The precise sexual acts meant by the term sodomy are rarely spelled out in the law, but are typically understood and defined by many courts and jurisdictions to include any or all forms of sexual acts that are illegal, illicit, unlawful, unnatural and immoral. Sodomy typically includes anal sex, oral sex, manual sex, and bestiality. In practice, sodomy laws have rarely been enforced to target against sexual activities between individuals of the opposite sex, and have mostly been used to target against sexual activities between individuals of the same sex.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Bermuda, a British Overseas Territory, face legal challenges not experienced by non-LGBT residents. Homosexuality is legal in Bermuda, but the territory has long held a reputation for being homophobic and intolerant. Since 2013, the Human Rights Act has prohibited discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons in Antigua and Barbuda may face legal challenges not experienced by non-LGBTQ citizens.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Barbados do not possess the same legal rights as non-LGBT people. In December 2022, the courts ruled Barbados' laws against buggery and "gross indecency" were unconstitutional and struck them from the Sexual Offences Act. However, there is no recognition of same-sex relationships and only limited legal protections against discrimination.
LGBTQ+ rights in the Cayman Islands are regarded as some of the most progressive in the Caribbean. While the British territory still has a long way to go, it continues to relax its stance on this subject. Both male and female types of same-sex sexual activity are legal in the Cayman Islands. Same-sex unions became legal in 2020.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons in the British Overseas Territory of the Turks and Caicos Islands face legal challenges not experienced by non-LGBTQ residents. Same-sex sexual activity has been legal in the Turks and Caicos Islands since 2001, and discrimination based on sexual orientation is constitutionally banned.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBTQ) persons in Belize face legal challenges not experienced by non-LGBT citizens, although attitudes have been changing in recent years. Same-sex sexual activity was decriminalized in Belize in 2016, when the Supreme Court declared Belize's anti-sodomy law unconstitutional. Belize's constitution prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex, which Belizean courts have interpreted to include sexual orientation.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people living in Saint Lucia face legal challenges not experienced by non-LGBTQ members of the population. Same-sex sexual activity is illegal for males, though the law is not enforced.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines face legal challenges not experienced by non-LGBT residents. The Penal Code makes same-sex sexual acts illegal with a punishment up to 10 years in prison, although the law is not enforced. In addition, it outlaws the practice of "buggery", whether homosexual or heterosexual and irrespective of whether the act was consensual. The country's laws also do not address discrimination or harassment on account of sexual orientation or gender identity, nor recognize same-sex unions in any form, whether it be marriage or partnerships. Households headed by same-sex couples are not eligible for any of the same rights given to opposite-sex married couples. In 2024, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines upheld its constitutional ban on same-sex sexual activity within its High Court.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people living in Nauru may face legal and social challenges not experienced by non-LGBT residents. Same-sex sexual activity has been legal since May 2016, but there are no legal recognition of same-sex unions, or protections against discrimination in the workplace or the provision of goods and services.
Homosexual relations were legalised in the state of Israel in 1988, and during the 1990s various forms of discrimination were prohibited, making LGBT rights in Israel the most progressive in the Middle East. Debate has since centred on recognition of same-sex partnerships and the rights they confer, including inheritance, residency, and the adoption of children. The staging of LGBT pride parades has been controversial in some cases.
The majority of the countries of the Commonwealth of Nations, formerly known as the British Commonwealth, still criminalise sexual acts between consenting adults of the same sex and other forms of sexual orientation, gender identity and expression. Homosexual activity remains a criminal offence in 29 of the 56 sovereign states of the Commonwealth; and legal in only 26.
In the U.S. Virgin Islands, Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights have evolved substantially in recent years. Same-sex sexual activity has been legal since 1985. The region also provides explicit legal protections against discrimination for LGBTQ residents since December 2022. Following the Supreme Court's ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges on June 26, 2015, which found the denial of marriage rights to same-sex couples unconstitutional, same-sex marriage became legal in the islands.
LGBT rights differ between the various states in the Caribbean. They are influenced by previous colonization from Europe as well as each state's own interpretation of laws. For many of the states, perceptions of LGBT individuals are unfavorable, and laws lack protections and rights for the community.
This is a list of notable events in the history of LGBT rights taking place in the year 2023.
![Recognition of same-sex unions in the Lesser Antilles and Puerto Rico
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Same-sex marriage
Unregistered cohabitation
Island subject to IACHR ruling
No recognition of same-sex couples
Constitutional ban on same-sex marriage
Same-sex sexual activity illegal but penalties not enforced
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