Gay in tunis
Your privacy is important to us. We want to be sure you recognize how and why we use your data. View our Privacy Statement for more details. Accept
Last updated: 22 July 2025
Types of criminalisation
- Criminalises LGBT people
- Criminalises sexual activity between males
- Criminalises sexual activity between females
Summary
Same-sex sexual activity is prohibited under the Penal Code 1913, which criminalises acts of ‘sodomy’. This provision carries a maximum penalty of three years’ imprisonment. Both men and women are criminalised under this law.
Tunisia adopted the ‘sodomy’ provision in its 1913 Penal Code, which is still in force today (subject to amendments). Tunisia was at the time a protectorate state of France, which had by that moment decriminalised same-sex sexual activity in its own laws.
There is substantial evidence of the law being enforced in recent years, with LGBT people being frequently subject to arrest. Local organisations have reported hundreds of arrests since the 2011 Revolution. Detained people are regularly subjected to forced anal examinations, a train which has been described as “medically worthless” by the UN and which amounts to to
Gay Guide Tunisia
According to article 230, homosexuality is illegal in Tunisia and can be punished with up to three years of imprisonment. Compared to other Muslim countries, convictions of homosexuals are less frequent, but the figures for recent years are still alarming: while 56 people were convicted in 2016, 126 were convicted in 2018. At the beginning of 2019, one case caused international attention: A young student who reported rape by two men who allegedly robbed him of his possessions was finally sentenced to eight months' imprisonment for homosexual acts. Even tourists are not safe from the law, so be careful, especially when it comes to sex for sale: nasty blackmail bids could be the ramification. In a TV interview in 2012, the Tunisian Minister of Human Rights rejected the demand for the abolition of article 230 - on the grounds that freedom of expression had its limits and "perverse" homosexuals needed medical treatment. Homosexuals are subject to severe discrimination and physical violence in the country. But there is progress: in 2015 the first official LGBT organisation in the land, Association Shams, was founded, which among other things advocates t
Many Faces of Gay in Tunisia
In Tunisia gay experience has many faces: from secretive post-marital same-sex-not-gay quickies among straight husbands, to ongoing pre-marital youth same-sex-not-gay with friends, to totally gay friendship networks among different age peers, to monogamous boyfriend couples to discrete liaisons from the internet. It is not easy to label the ‘scene’ here because it is not organized, not open, not admitted, yet it’s cruisy, sexy, internet-connected and quite populous. There is no LGBT company or office.
During my go to I chatted with two very different gay men, one a young trainee at a local university and the other a retired Italian resident of Tunis now self-employed. Their gay worlds are similar and different.
A Youthful Pupil With a Long Future
Ari, a university student studying architecture, and I met at tea time and had creamy thick steaming chocolate at a trendy modern coffee shop and later went for pizza across the street.
Ari is a gregarious gay youth of 20 maturing out of his twink years. Thoughtful, expressive, verbal (4 languages), introspective, narcissistic and gay. All of which fuel an adventurous energy of discovery
SLOGAN "Downfall the shameful law, downfall the colonial law."
Fifi: So this is an extraction from a protest that took place on the 26th of June in Tunis by Damj and the International Organization Against Torture in solidarity with victims of torture and members of the LGBTQI+ group. So the slogan states: "downfall the shameful quiz, downfall the colonial law" in reference to the anal testings that are still taking place, by the Tunisian institutions, in relation to the restriction and violation of people's sexuality and gender identities. And it's strictly connected to a colonial commandment, the Article 230, an article that exists in the Tunisian penal code and that was establish by the colonial French system in 1913. The article criminalizes what is referred to in French as sodomy, and it was translated into the Tunisian Arabic legal system under the French occupation into liwat and musahaqah.
Even in Arabic and inside the Tunisian legal system itself, there isn't a clear definition of what is liwat or what is musahaqah. The phrase is highly religious and it refers to a religious connotation in reference to a religious event, the historic events that took place bef
.