The head of the Italian Conference of Catholic Bishops, Genoa Archbishop Angelo Bagnasco, is under increased police protection due to continuing threats following a recent homophobic outburst.

Bagnasco angered gays when he said: “Why say ‘no’ to forms of legally recognized cohabitation which create alternatives to the family? Why say ‘no’ to incest? Why say ‘no’ to the pedophile party in Holland?”

First, someone spray-painted “Shame On You Bagnasco” on the Genoa cathedral. And now “Death to Bagnasco” graffiti has appeared around the city accompanied by the logo of a left-wing terrorist group.

Bagnasco made the homophobic remarks shortly after the bishops conference instructed Catholic members of Parliament to vote against Italy’s pending civil-union legislation.

A police officer is now posted at Bagnasco’s office, officers have increased armed patrols in the area and plainclothes cops are on site when Bagnasco conducts mass.

PhoenixTV.com is airing China’s first gay talk show on the Web.

The weekly program, Tongxing Xianglian, features celebrities, lawyers, teachers, psychologists, social workers and others discussing sex, identity, discrimination and other matters.

It is hosted by Didier Zheng and produced by Gang Gang, both of whom are openly gay.

According to Shanghai Daily, the show’s name is a play on the words of the Chinese idiom “People with the same afflictions sympathize with each other.” But the Chinese characters also can be translated directly as “Same-Sex Love,” said one of this column’s Chinese correspondents.

“In the West, it is usually pressure brought [on gays] by religion,” Gang told the Daily. “In China, it is usually family and neighbors and peers.”

The founder of Nepal’s only gay group, Sunil Pant of the Blue Diamond Society, will receive the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission’s annual Felipe de Souza Award and its $5,000 stipend in May.

“Blue Diamond Society is one of the most effective human rights groups in the world,” said IGLHRC executive director Paula Ettelbrick. “What Sunil and other members have been able to do in such a short time to build visibility and effective action around LGBT issues in Nepal and international renown among their global peers is nothing short of astounding.”

Pant says the six-year-old group is “currently working hard to enshrine equality, non-discrimination, freedom and security in Nepal’s new constitution.”

“The challenge for us is that major political parties don’t take our issues seriously and this means we have to work hard to convince them,” he said. “Funding is another major challenge as we don’t receive any support from the government and it is difficult to find donors who are willing to support LGBT rights work.”

The group also sponsors community forums, media campaigns, social events, talent shows, a Pride festival and International Day Against Homophobia events. And it is planning the nation’s first GLBT film festival, to be held in mid-May at Kathmandu City Hall. The organization also works to help GLBT people who are mistreated by gay-bashers, police and officials.

“We have more than 40,000 LGBT people in our database, of which more than 10,000 are actively supporting BDS across the country,” Pant said.

According to IGLHRC Communications Coordinator Hossein Alizadeh, members of the Nepalese GLBT community identify somewhat differently from similar people in the West.

“Effeminate homosexual men are referred to as metis, singarus or kothis,” Alizadeh said. “Gay or bisexual men who are not necessarily feminine are known as dohoris. [T]he sexual partners of metis and dohoris are known as tas. They see themselves as masculine and mostly act like heterosexual males. In fact, they often consider themselves as heterosexuals. Finally, those who are born biologically male and wish to be female are called hijras or eunuchs. Some undergo castration and join the hijra community.”

Alizadeh said “there is no open gay life” in Nepal.

“Gay men mostly are either forced into marriage by their families or are left with no choice but to leave the country,” he said.

Gay sex is not banned but under a law on bestiality, unnatural sexual acts, which are not defined, are punishable with up to a year in prison or a $70 fine, IGLHRC said.

Police in Mandeville, Jamaica, had to restore order at the funeral of businessman Kirk Wayne Lester on April 8 after some mourners smashed windows and threw rocks and bottles at crossdressers in attendance at the True Vine Fellowship Church.

Other mourners ran for cover or spoke in tongues during the mêlée, according to the Jamaica Observer newspaper.

The incident follows two other recent mob actions by anti-gay Jamaicans.

On April 2, three gay men were attacked by a mob at Montego Bay’s MoBay Nite Out carnival event. The men, one of whom was hospitalized, angered other attendees when they took to a stage and gyrated on each other, the Observer said. The crowd threw rocks and bottles at the men and, when the men returned fire, the crowd lunged for them, chased them down and beat them.

On Feb. 14, a mob surrounded a pharmacy in Kingston and demanded that four gay men inside come out and face punishment for being homosexuals.

The crowd formed after another shopper took exception to the men’s presence and began screaming that “battymen,” or faggots, must be killed.

Police fired tear gas into that crowd of 200 and rescued the men. But after removing them from the scene, officers disparaged the men en route to, and at, the police station, according to the Jamaica Forum for Lesbians, All-Sexuals and Gays. One of the rescued men, J-FLAG leader Gareth Williams, said officers hit him in the head and struck him in the stomach with a rifle.

Assistance: Bill Kelley