Two men publicly flogged in Indonesia for gay sex

Two men were publicly flogged in Indonesia's conservative Aceh province on Thursday after they were found guilty of sexual relations by a court operating under strict Islamic law.

While gay sex is not illegal elsewhere in Indonesia -- the world's most populous Muslim-majority nation -- it is outlawed in Aceh, which imposes a version of sharia, the Islamic legal code.

The flogging began before midday at a park in provincial capital Banda Aceh, with one man accused of instigating the relationship lashed 82 times and the second man 77 times.

Both were caned with a rattan stick as dozens watched on, according to an AFP journalist present.

The men's sentences were reduced by three lashes for three months spent in detention.

In November, locals raided a rented room in Banda Aceh and found the two men -- both students at a local university -- together.

They were taken to sharia police for the alleged crime of sexual relations.

Rights advocates slammed the punishment as part of a wider trend of discrimination against LGBTQ people in the country.

"The intimidation, discrimination and abuses against LGBTQ individuals in Aceh are like a bottomless well," Andreas Harsono, Indonesia researcher at Human Rights Watch, told AFP.

"The Aceh government should learn from these mistakes and review their Islamic criminal code."

Amnesty International called the punishment a "horrifying act of discrimination" against the two men.

"Intimate sexual relations between consenting adults should never be criminalized, and no one should be punished because of their real or perceived sexual orientation," Amnesty's Deputy Regional Director Montse Ferrer said in a statement.

Two other men were flogged at the same park 34 and eight times respectively on Thursday for online gambling, according to prosecutors.

Medical services were on standby for all the men.

Caning retains strong support among Aceh's population as a common punishment for a range of offenses that include gambling, drinking alcohol and adultery.

The region started using religious law after it was granted special autonomy in 2001, an attempt by the central government to quell a long-running separatist insurgency.

© Agence France-Presse