[JURIST] Ugandan politicians have drawn up new anti-gay legislation with cross-bench support to be presented before parliament by the end of the year, according to Thursday media reports. The new legislation comes nearly a year after the Ugandan parliament passed the Anti-Homosexuality Act [text, PDF] that would have sentenced homosexuals up to life in prison. The bill was struck down [JURIST report] on a technicality by the country’s Constitutional Court [official website] last August. According to a leaked copy [Al Jazeera report] of the new draft bill, lawmakers have focused on prohibiting the “promotion” of homosexuality, which will carry a sentence of up to seven years in jail. Activists have called the previous law draconian and abominable, and both the EU and the US have condemned the law.

The Ugandan anti-gay law’s history has garnered international attention since it signed into law February, and many see it as a reaction to major legislative reforms in support of same-sex marriage [JURIST backgrounder] in the US and other Western nations. Last November a Ugandan religious leader bolstered [JURIST report] the law when it was still a bill. In February of that year Ugandan MP David Bahati announced that clauses mandating the death penalty for “aggravated homosexuality” would be dropped [JURIST report] from the controversial bill. In 2010 US President Barack Obama and then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton joined the US Congress in denouncing the bill [JURIST report]. Roughly two-thirds [BBC report, map] of African nations criminalize homosexuality, according to an Amnesty International report published earlier this year.