Strasbourg, 31/08/10 – "The rights of transgender persons are still ignored or violated. Stronger actions are needed to eradicate discrimination against them" said the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, Thomas Hammarberg, publishing today his latest human rights comment.
"Transgender persons face obstacles in obtaining legal recognition of their preferred gender. Some Council of Europe member states still have no provision at all for official recognition, leaving transgender people in a legal limbo. Worse, most member states still use medical classifications which impose the diagnosis of mental disorder on transgender persons."
Very common are also provisions which set unreasonable and unjustified conditions, such as forced divorce and forced sterilisation. "These requirements clearly run against the principles of human rights and human dignity, as also underlined by Court decisions in Austria and Germany."
However, some signs of improvement also begin to appear. The Irish government plans to introduce legislation to recognise transgender persons in their preferred gender including the possibility for them to obtain new birth certificates. There are indications that other countries might follow and improve their legal framework for transgender persons, such as Portugal, Hungary and the Netherlands.
"All countries need to develop expeditious and transparent procedures for changing the name and gender of a transgender person on official documents, in accordance with the case-law of the European Court of Human Rights" concluded the Commissioner.