In 18 days, thousands of teenage athletes will arrive in Dakar for the Youth Olympic Games, the first Olympic event ever held on the African continent. On Monday, Human Rights Watch put a hard question in front of everyone involved: what does an Olympic Charter that “prohibits discrimination on any grounds” mean in a country that is arresting people for who they love?

The answer, for now, is silence. HRW says it wrote to Senegal’s justice minister and police leadership on September 29. When its report went out on October 12, nobody had replied.

Here’s what the report found, and why the timing matters.

The law that changed in March

Same-sex conduct has been a crime in Senegal since 1965. On March 11, 2026, parliament made it much harsher, amending article 319 of the penal code by 135 votes to zero, with three abstentions, HRW reports:

  • Up to 10 years in prison for same-sex conduct, double the old maximum.
  • Fines of 2 million to 10 million CFA francs (about $3,000 to $17,000).
  • A new offence of “promotion”: promoting, “glorifying” or financing LGBT people or organisations can mean up to 7 years.
  • No leniency: judges can’t suspend sentences or go below the minimum.

We covered the law’s signing in April and the first conviction under it: a 24-year-old man sentenced to six years, with no lawyer. HRW’s report is the first big picture of what’s happened since.

Hundreds of arrests

Nobody has a precise count, and HRW is upfront that it couldn’t verify the totals itself. The Senegalese rights group RADDHO counted 212 arrests between February and July. The HIV Justice Network puts it at more than 300.

The arrests weren’t limited to Dakar. HRW lists Thiès, Rosso, Saint-Louis, Yeumbeul and Ziguinchor. Most, according to RADDHO, were made by gendarmes in Keur Massar on Dakar’s outskirts. QNews, summarising the report, notes police used phone data to identify suspects and raided private homes.

“Detentions, violence, and abuse against LGBT individuals have sharply increased across the country,” RADDHO’s secretary-general, Mouhamadou Seck, told HRW.

Forced HIV tests, and a health system people now avoid

The most alarming part of the report is about health. HRW says authorities forced most detainees to take HIV tests and then used positive results in charges. Of those arrested, 82 were charged with “voluntary HIV transmission.” A court threw those charges out in August, but the damage had been done: in at least four cases, media reports closely matched case files, including HIV status, suggesting leaks to journalists.

The result is predictable and dangerous. “One-third no longer come in for appointments to seek HIV treatment,” a Dakar doctor told HRW. UNAIDS had already warned in March that the tougher law threatened Senegal’s HIV response.

Lawyers who are scared to show up

The “promotion” offence has a quieter effect too. Lawyers told HRW that defending someone can look like supporting them. “How can we represent people arrested without being accused of promotion,” one Dakar lawyer asked. Another, quoted by RFI, put the principle simply: “What matters to me is: were their rights respected or not?”

HRW also heard from people who’ve gone into hiding or left the country, and from a university psychologist who says her consultations have “tripled” since March.

Why the Olympics matter here

The fourth Summer Youth Olympic Games run in Dakar from October 31 to November 13. RFI reports nearly 3,000 athletes aged 17 and under across 25 sports, with organisers planning 800,000 tickets, most of them handed out through a youth programme and local community groups.

HRW isn’t calling for a boycott. It’s asking for specific things:

  • President Bassirou Diomaye Faye should order the release of everyone detained under article 319 since February, send the amended law to the Constitutional Council, and publicly commit to protecting everyone during the Games.
  • The National Assembly should repeal article 319 and stop treating HIV status as a reason to punish.
  • The government should ban forced HIV testing and stop health data reaching the press.

“Senegal’s government should call a halt to this crackdown, which threatens everyone’s rights,” said Larissa Kojoué, HRW’s LGBT rights researcher.

RFI’s report carried no response from the International Olympic Committee. In an August interview cited by QNews, the IOC said Senegalese authorities had assured it that host agreement commitments would be respected, and that it can’t change a sovereign country’s laws. ILGA World wants those protections written down and published, for athletes, journalists, volunteers and workers alike.

There’s one more audience in town: the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights is meeting in Dakar from October 12 to 21. Its Resolution 275, adopted in 2014, already calls on African governments to protect people from violence based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

What happens next

Two dates to watch. The Commission session closes on October 21. The Games open on October 31. Between now and then, the clearest signal would be the one HRW asked for: a public promise from the president that nobody will be arrested for who they are while the world is watching, and an end to the arrests after the cameras leave.

Until then, the people carrying the weight of this law are the ones who don’t get to leave when the closing ceremony ends.

Sources: Human Rights Watch, “Senegal: Brutal Crackdown Violates LGBT People’s Rights” (Oct 12, 2026); RFI via inkl; QNews. Photo: Kurt Cotoaga / Unsplash.