The Portuguese Socialist Prime-Minister Antonio Guterres, stated when asked by a journalist what were his thoughts on gay and lesbian legal unions, that legislation on same-sex marriges are not out of the question, and that personally it didn't constitute any moral problem. The first lesbian and gay newspaper is scheduled to be released in January 1996. The newspaper run by a group of independent lesbian and gay citizens has had contact with ILGA-Portugal in order to combine stratagies and cooperation. The lesbian owned paper shall be published every two months until demand increases. This group may be contacted at the moment through ILGA-Portugal. A Portuguese Quilt Movement has also started in Lisbon. Attached to the American Quilt movement, it has marked it's first public appearance at an AIDS exhibition at the Lisbon Science Museum, where most AIDS/HIV NGO's were represented (as well as ILGA-Portugal). The ideia of starting such a movement in Portugal was the responsibility of gay widower Jorge Almeida. Jorge may be contacted by telephone at +351-1-2910265 From 22H00-24H00 GMT. On the other hand ILGA-Portugal is being very well accepted by the gay and lesbian community. Our support grows steadily. We have preliminary contacts with an Irish organization with whom we wish to promote cooperation and resource exchange within the E.U. funding schemes. This is still uncertain but gives us enough hope to get our organization off the ground in financial terms, consequently allowing us to achieve some of our many projects. On the 5th of December, our Chairman, Goncalo Diniz made a very applauded speech before the people, TV and Newspapers present at the Ethics Conference in Lisbon, organized by the HIV/AIDS NGO Abraco. ILGA-Portugal was invited to make a statement relating HIV/AIDS and Homosexuality. The speech, part of it later aired on national television during a news broadcast, evoked for the first time in this country the need for legislation on same-sex marriges and the inclusion of the term sexual orientation when referring to discrimination in the portuguese constitution. The inexistance of rights of individuals with ill (or dead) partners was also publicly denounced. Furthermore, the knowledge of ilegal companies specialized in ilegal gathering and commercialization of personal and intimate data of citizens (such as HIV status and sexual orientation) for employment, mortgage, insurance and scholarship reasons, surprised the media and general public present. Although no names were mentioned (due to lack of information) it left many people "itchy". At the conference were among other people, Dr. Paulo Pedroso (The Aid of the Minister of Social Security), Dr. Catalina Pestana (Aid to the Minister of Education), Dr. Maria de Belem Roseira Pina (Minsiter of Health), Dr. Ribeiro da Silva (Ethics Commision of Saint Mary's Hospital in Lisbon), Dr. Julio Castro Caldas (Specialist in Portuguese Law) Dr. Odete Ferreira (the coordinator of The National Commision for Fighting AIDS). As to the conclusion taken from the conference, it can surely be said that the Portuguese government still holds on to it's conservative catholic values, refusing to take decisive steps regarding AIDS prevention (e.g. condom distribution in public schools and prisons, adoption of the subject of sexual education in schools, etc. etc.). The moralist campagning done by the National Commision for Fighting AIDS (a government agency) with ridiculous messages such as "each family is an AIDS prevention center" and censoring NGO televison campaigns funded by the commision is highly negative and this attitude is seriously hindering the work done by NGO's in the HIV/AIDS area. Nontheless one must give the Commision its due credit for exploring "domains never touched before" although very afraid of shocking the "good catholic morals". ILGA - PORTUGAL Our Address: Apartado 21281 Lisboa 1131 Lisboa Codex Portugal email: ilga@telepac.pt Homepage: http://alfa.ist.utl.pt/~l36661/ilga Tel/Fax:+351-1-2545383