Lebanon military judge rules homosexuality not a crime

Landmark legal decision marks historic change in the country's military forces.

A top military prosecutor in Lebanon has ruled that homosexuality is not a crime, Lebanon’s Daily Star has reported.

In a landmark decision, Judge Peter Germanos on Saturday ruled against prosecuting four soldiers. The men were dismissed from their posts in a “sodomy” case.

The Daily Star reported Germanos as saying: “Sodomy is not punishable by law”.

The judge also decided not to issue arrest warrants for violating Penal Code Article 534. This states that “any sexual act contrary to nature is punishable by imprisonment of one year.”

Germanos said that a controversial article of the Lebanese penal code failed to clarify what sexual acts are “against nature”.