Gays face death by stoning in Brunei, the ‘Saudi of Southeast Asia’. Really?

International celebrities from Ellen to Elton John have been quick to condemn Brunei’s recent decision to implement hardline Islamic laws that prescribe death by stoning for offences such as sodomy and extramarital sex.

John Lee, a 35-year-old South Korean freelancer who was born in Brunei and lived there for 19 years, said comparisons to the notoriously repressive Middle Eastern kingdom of Saudi Arabia – as made by Bridget Welsh, a specialist on the region at John Cabot University in Italy – are particularly galling.

“Saudi Arabian princes are known to have killed and dismembered foreign journalists. The Sultan of Brunei is not known to have been involved in the death of anyone,” he said.

“When many people in the West hear of Islam, all they see are images of IS beheadings and burka-clad Afghan women. Many don’t realise that not all Muslim countries are the same and that there are various shades of Muslims on a very wide spectrum. It’s very discouraging.”

Homosexuality has long been illegal in Brunei, but it was not until 2014 that Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah decided to introduce the phased implementation of harsher punishments in adherence with sharia law. In a country that lacks elected representatives, a free press or freedom of assembly, the absence of domestic protest to this move was hardly a surprise.