Legal status of same-sex relations in Latin America & Caribbean 2020

In December of 2020, nine countries in Latin America and the Caribbean had laws that considered private, consensual sexual acts between adults of the same sex a crime or illegal.

Which countries in the Caribbean criminalize same-sex relations?

Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and Saint Lucia categorize consensual sexual acts between adults of the same sex either as "buggery" or "gross indecency". In Antigua and Barbuda and Saint Lucia, for instance, only homosexual relations between men are considered illegal. Despite this, Latin America and the Caribbean shows a generally high level of LGBT-friendliness toward consensual same-sex acts.

Where was same-sex intercourse first legalized in the region?

Haiti has the oldest legal framework that did not criminalize homosexual relations in Latin America and the Caribbean, dating back to 1791, when it was still under French rule. This makes it one of the first countries in the world to not consider same-sex intercourse a crime. Other pioneering countries on the matter were the Dominican Republic and El Salvador, whose laws did not consider same-sex sexual acts a crime since the 1820s.