NewsWrap for the week ending June 23, 2012

SUMMARY

Wall Coming Down - A groundbreaking two-day LGBT leadership conference in Beijing makes Chinese history …

Big Flap Yields Little Win - Ugandan Ethics Minister Simon Lokodo orders police to shut down an "illegal" LGBT workshop in Kampala ironically intended to train activists on how to report human rights abuses, Lokodo then threatens to ban 38 local and international NGOs that he says are funding "homosexual recruitment," but international criticism prompts a hastily issued statement that may be the first-ever Ugandan government affirmation of the basic rights of LGBT people …

Bearded Bar-hopping - gay bars in Kenya are reportedly barring entry to LGBT people who can't "pass as straight," but Pride is celebrated for the first time at the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi …

Parliament Bringing Up the Rear - despite overwhelming public support, two bills in the Australian Parliament to open civil marriage to lesbian and gay couples don't appear to have enough votes for passage …

Rushing DOMA to the Hospital - the high-priced attorneys hired by GOP House leadership to defend the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in federal court reportedly ask the U.S. Supreme Court to fast-track their appeal of a federal appeals court decision calling a key provision of DOMA unconstitutional, and ask that a pending district court case be put on hold because a Supreme Court DOMA ruling would address the issues raised in that lawsuit …

We Thought the Swings Were IN the Trees - a letter to the editor of the Findlay, Ohio "Courier" damns "shameful" bisexual trees ….

Complete NewsWrap text and this week's podcast to be posted June 26th.