Belize – COI

Caleb Orozco (LGBTI)

 
Caleb Orzoco has been an LGBTI and human rights advocate for over 7 years and involved in human development work for over 20 years. As the leader and founding member of the United Belize Advocacy Movement (UNIBAM), Caleb Orozco has been the face of the LGBTI issue in the local media and in civil society meetings. He has initiated the first in-country litigation challenge among CARICOM member states to change Belize’s sodomy law and has documented abuses of assault, rape and murder occurring in Belize since 1997. He has conducted research on stigma and discrimination, as well as worked on community education around rights-protection and enforcement, and has led the way to the development of the only LGBT Legal Review in the country along with the current refinement of a white paper on violence. He has undertaken the country’s Universal Periodic Review for 2009 and 2013, as well as the ICCPR in 2013, with partners Heartland Alliance and the Sexual Rights Initiative. As an advocate internationally, Caleb Orozco has worked at the OAS through a coalition of LAC activists since 2007, advancing resolution on violence regionally through the loose LGBTI network, the Caribbean Forum for the Liberation and Acceptance of All Genders and Sexualities (CARIFLAGS), and collectively addressing the UN Resolution on Extrajudicial Killings which included sexual orientation as part of its concerns.