FILE PHOTO: Burundi President Evariste Ndayishimiye in Bujumbura, Burundi on May 6, 2023. REUTERS/Evrard Ngendakumana/File Photo
The United States said Friday it was troubled by comments from Burundian President Evariste Ndayishimiye, who last week called on citizens of the small African country to stone gay people.
The comments escalated a crackdown on sexual minorities in a nation where LGBT people already face social ostracism and jail terms of up to two years if convicted of same-sex offenses.
“The United States is deeply troubled by President Ndayishimiye’s remarks targeting certain vulnerable and marginalized Burundians,” US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement.
“We call on all of Burundi’s leaders to respect the inherent dignity and inalienable rights, including equal access to justice, of every member of Burundian society.”
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The statement did not refer specifically to the remarks about stoning.
“If you want to attract a curse to the country, accept homosexuality,” Ndayishimiye said in a question and answer session with journalists and the public held in Burundi’s east on Friday.
“I even think that these people, if we find them in Burundi, it is better to lead them to a stadium and stone them. And that cannot be a sin,” he said, describing homosexuality as imported from the West.
His comments were the latest show of widening intolerance of LGBT people in the region.
In May, Uganda passed a law that carried the death sentence for certain categories of same-sex offenses. The United States has imposed a range of sanctions including travel restrictions and removing Uganda from a tariff-free trade deal.
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