Burkina Faso has banned homosexuality, with sentences of up to 5 years in prison.

The Transitional Legislative Assembly (ALT), which functions as the Parliament in Burkina Faso and is under the control of a military junta, unanimously approved a bill that punishes homosexuality with sentences of up to five years in prison.

On Monday, ALT gave the green light to the reform of the Code of Persons and the Family, which establishes penalties ranging from two to five years in prison, as well as fines, for those found guilty of being gay, according to local media reports.

The Minister of Justice, Rodrigue Bayala, indicated that, in cases of recidivism, if the sanctioned person doesn't have Burkinabe nationality, "they will be expelled from the country without further ado," according to the Burkina Information Agency (AIB), the official media outlet.

Meanwhile, various international organizations described the new legislation as a "serious setback" that contradicts the supposed "progressive measures" included in the Code.

"However, we are alarmed and deeply concerned by the criminalization of same-sex relationships. This only generates discrimination and violates the right to equality before the law," said Marceau Sivieude, regional director of Amnesty International for West and Central Africa.

This new regulation adds to the rise of anti-LGBT discourse in Africa, a continent where more than thirty countries out of the more than sixty that exist in the world maintain laws that criminalize same-sex relationships.

Burkina Faso experienced two coups d'état in 2022: the first on January 24, led by Lieutenant Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba, and the second on September 30, headed by Captain Ibrahim Traoré, the current dictator, who is a pro-Russian military officer and began his career in the African revolutionary Marxist student movement.