A new survey that was conducted across five continents found that 80% of women think trans women should have equal rights.

For the survey, the Thomas Reuters Foundation asked 1,000 women in Cairo, London, Mexico City, New York and Tokyo: “Should transgender women have the same rights as other women?” 798 women answered yes, with just 37 saying no. The rest declined to answer.

Women in Mexico City showed the highest levels of support for trans women, with 89% answering ‘yes’ when questioned for the survey, which was conducted on the streets of the cities between August 13-24.London and New York were the closest to follow with 87% saying trans women should have equal rights in both cities. 75% of women answered affirmatively in Tokyo and 62% in Cairo.

The results were particularly surprising for Cairo. While the survey suggested that less women there are supportive of trans rights than other cities, it also suggested that a majority of women are supportive.

This is despite the fact that LGBT+ people in Egypt continue to face discrimination. A 2013 Pew Research Centre survey found that 95% of Egyptians do not believe that homosexuality should be accepted by society.

Meanwhile, both gay and trans people can be prosecuted under a law that forbids prostitution and “debauchery”.

The situation for trans women is also tense in Japan, where the law currently requires them to be sterilised and to have a diagnosis of “gender identity disorder.”

However, an LGBT+ rights expert at Human Rights Watch, Kyle Knight, told the Thomas Reuters Foundation News that there is “a huge tide turning in Japan” and said the results were “super encouraging.”

The results may also come as a surprise to some in the UK after a number of anti-trans incidents have occurred in recent months.

In July, Pride in London was hijacked by a group of anti-trans campaigners. 

The group carried signs with anti-trans slogans, such as “transactivists erase lesbians”, while they distributed leaflets opposing trans-friendly reforms to the Gender Recognition Act, and calling for trans women to be banned from women’s spaces.

The campaigners briefly lay on the ground to physically block the march from continuing, but after negotiations with Pride staff were permitted to get up and march the entire route.

A man from North Carolina in the US could be at risk of having to leave the UK and return to the States, despite the fact that he is married to a UK citizen.

Brian Page had his latest appeal to the UK Home Office for an extension of his visa refused earlier this month, and was told that he must either leave the UK within 14 days, or apply for permission to appeal to the Upper Tribunal, the next stage of the process.

However, he has told PinkNews that he and his husband have been “cleaned out” by the legal fees up until now, having already spent over £16,000 on the application. They are now appealing to the public for help to cover the legal costs of their appeal to the Upper Tribunal.

Their GoFundMe page is here. If they are granted permission to appeal to the Upper Tribunal, they expect the legal fees to cost in the region of £1,500-£3,000.

Speaking to PinkNews, Brian said that they had considered returning to the US – however, they were horrified to discover that when they lived there previously, Ben had inadvertently overstayed his visa by a year and a half.

They had misunderstood the terms of his visa at the time, thinking he was allowed to stay in the country for two years. They later discovered that he was actually only granted permission to stay for six months, meaning he lived in the US illegally for a year and a half.

This means that he could be subject to a 10 year ban from the US if they attempted to return there.

With Brian facing deportation and Ben not allowed to enter the United States, the couple could end up being separated by immigration laws of the UK and the US.

“We would be split up. I would be heartbroken,” Brian told PinkNews.

“When Ben’s mother passed away, he went into a deep, deep depression and it really scared me. We are both suffering from mental health issues and are both on anti-depressants, because our lives are on hold.

“We don’t know where we’re going to be in a few months time. I’m afraid to leave Ben because I don’t know what’s going to happen.”

Brian and Ben’s story began in 2012 when they met on a train in London when Brian was visiting the UK. They ended up talking and decided to stay in touch.

They got married two years later in New York after spending a period of time living together in the US.

However, tragedy hit the couple when, shortly after they got married, they found out that Ben’s mother – who was still living in the UK – was terminally ill.

They returned to the UK, with Brian on a six month visa, to spend her final months with her.

As his six-month visa came to a close, Brian’s mother-in-law’s condition was continuing to deteriorate. He then applied for an extension to the visa, which was ultimately rejected.

They now say they have been fighting the UK government to allow Brian to stay in the UK for a number of years.

They have now applied for permission to appeal their case to the Upper Tribunal, however if they are granted permission, they do not have the money to pay for legal representation.

They also estimate that, if they were to attempt to return to the US, legal fees there could cost up to $15,000 in order to get Ben’s potential 10 year ban overturned.

The couple now say that they are in a bind – they cannot return to the US together, as Ben is not allowed in the country. They cannot stay in the UK together, as Brian’s applications to remain have been rejected.

In the most recent rejection letter, which was seen by PinkNews, the judge suggested the couple could relocate to a third country, and gave Canada as an example, while trying to settle their immigration dispute.

The rejection letter also says that during the case, it was put to Brian that he could “return to the USA to apply for entry clearance to re-enter the UK as a spouse.”

Brian says that if he were to do this, the process could take up to two years.

Brian said that he was worried about leaving Ben alone in the UK as he suffers from depression and anxiety.

“It really scares me. I’m really scared right now about what the next couple of months are going to be like,” he added.

A gay student who was forced to flee Kenya after his family tried to send him to a gay conversion camp has been awarded the Colin Higgins Foundation’s annual Youth Courage Award.

Mahad Olad’s terrifying ordeal in the summer of 2017 left him with no contact with his family, who brought him to Kenya under the pretence that it was a “vacation.”

Receiving the Youth Courage Award also means that he will receive a $10,000 grant. The award is given to an inspiring person within the LGBT+ community who has overcome adversity brought on by their identity.

Olad, who lives and studies in New York, opened up about his ordeal of almost being sent to a gay conversion camp in his student newspaper, The Ithacan.

He went on a holiday in the summer of 2017 to Kenya with his mother, who Olad says comes from an “extremely conservative Muslim background.”

However, upon arriving in Kenya, his mother told him that it was not a vacation, as he had been told, and that she had brought him there to send him to a gay conversion camp.

He was horrified to discover that his family had discovered the truth about his sexuality, which he had chosen to keep from them.

His mother asked him to withdraw from college in New York so he could be placed under the control of a group of sheiks who would reform his religious beliefs and “reorient” his sexuality.

“A few sheiks were at our hotel that night,” Olad wrote in his student newspaper earlier this year. “They briefly spoke to me about how being gay and atheist is unequivocally against my Islamic upbringing and African heritage.

“I knew that when they came back to get me the following morning, I would be forced to go with them.”

Olad said that the camps that operate in Kenya and Somalia are terrifying places where captives are subject to “severe beatings, shackling, food deprivation and other cruel practices.”

“Those who fail to cooperate, make adequate progress or try to escape could possibly be killed.”

Olad told his mother he was going for a walk that night and immediately called a group called the Ex-Muslims of North America, who helped him get out of Kenya and back to the United States. He is no longer in touch with his family.

Stonewall say that LGBT+ people continue to be exposed to harmful conversion therapy. A 2009 survey of over 1,300 accredited mental health professionals found that more than 200 had offered some form of conversion therapy.

A gay man was left in need of stitches when he and his friend were beaten up by a group in Kiev last weekend in a homophobic attack.

The harrowing incident happened after a group of men took issue with Nikita Ponarin’s choice of jeans and his septum piercing, he said in a post on Facebook.

Nikita had to get stitches on his head after the event and was left with a few bruises and scratches, but insists that the injuries are not serious.

He said that the incident has been reported to the police, and he is hopeful that it might have been caught on CCTV so that those responsible might be caught.

Despite the harrowing attack, Nikita told PinkNews that he plans to stay in Kiev, and said in his Facebook post that the city is “still beautiful.”

He is determined to remain positive, saying: “we are alive and almost healthy.”

He wanted to share his experience “not for empathy or pity,” but to show that hate crimes are still a reality for many LGBT+ people in 2018.

Recent research from UK charity Stonewall found that one in five LGBT+ people had experienced a hate crime because of their sexuality or gender identity in the preceding 12 months.

The same report revealed that 80% of these incidents go unreported, with younger LGBT+ people less likely than any others to go to the police.

There have been a number of high-profile hate crimes recently. Last week, gay porn star Wesley Woods opened up in a Twitter video about how he and a friend were beaten up for being gay in West Hollywood while out walking.

In the video, he said: “You’re not always safe in the places you think you are.”

Police in the UK also recently issued an appeal for help after a man was left with a broken back in a suspected homophobic attack after Pride in London last month.

A pride event in Kiev in June saw around 200 anti-LGBT+ protesters turning out, and organisers of the parade also received death threats online on the day of the march.

Despite this, attitudes in Ukraine to LGBT+ people are thought to have shifted in recent years, with a 2017 poll showing that 56% of Ukrainian people believing that gay and bisexual people should enjoy equal rights.