US lesbian soldier seeks asylum in Canada

Womens eNews reports that after suffering through months of anti-lesbian verbal and physical abuse, Private Bethany Smith received the anonymous death threat that convinced her to leave her post at Ft. Campbell, Kentucky in 2007, and head for Canada in the hopes of receiving asylum there.

"It said that they were going to break into the supply room and get the keys to my room and beat me to death in my bed," Smith said, adding that the letter came only a couple months after she learned the Army was deploying her to Afghanistan. "It was at that point that I knew I was more afraid of the people who were supposed to be on my side than people we were supposed to be fighting overseas."

More than 12,000 service members have lost their jobs because of the U.S. military's so-called "don't ask, don't tell" policy. A disproportionate number of those discharges are women, according to 2008 statistics gathered by the Washington-based Servicemembers Legal Defense Network from the government under the Freedom of Information Act.

After two years in Canada, Smith is still fighting to receive asylum. In November, Canadian Federal Court Justice Yves de Montigny ruled that the country's refugee board should reconsider Smith's case, which it had earlier denied.

The entire article is short and well worth reading.