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The Gambian government has rejected National Security Advisor Susan Rice’s recent comments against the country’s LGBT rights record.

An anchor on state-run television on June 5 read a lengthy statement from the Gambian government that noted Rice last month “described the rejection of gay and lesbian activities by the Gambia as a violation of human rights.”

Rice in a statement she released on the eve of the International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia said the U.S. is “deeply concerned about credible reports of torture, suspicious disappearances — including of two Americans — and arbitrary detention at the government’s hands.” She also described President Yahya Jammeh’s recent threat to slit the throats of gay men who live in his country as “unconscionable.”

“The government of the Gambia wishes to observe that the accusations made are the latest in a systematic campaign to damage the good image of the country and demonize its leadership because of its stance against the activities of the gay and lesbian community,” reads the statement from the Gambian government. “No amount of lies, pressure or threats will make us relent on our rejection of homosexuality.”

“The government of the Gambia will always adhere to our sacred religious values and will not be dictated by decadent and ungodly societies, nations or institutions,” it says.

The statement also reiterated the Gambian government’s opposition to marriage rights for same-sex couples.

“Even insects and bacteria reproduce respecting the order of nature,” it reads.

Gambian advocates and their supporters around the world have grown increasingly concerned about the African country’s LGBT rights record and Yammeh’s inflammatory rhetoric that includes describing gay men as “vermin” during a 2014 speech. The Gambian president also described homosexuality as one of the three “biggest threats to human existence” while speaking at the U.N. General Assembly in 2013.

The Obama administration last December announced that Gambia is no longer eligible to take part in a duty-free trade program that allows sub-Saharan African countries to access U.S. markets amid growing concerns over its LGBT rights record. The president faced criticism in August 2014 when he invited Jammeh to the White House during a summit that drew dozens of African heads of state to D.C.

A spokesperson for the National Security Council on Monday did not provide the Washington Blade with a specific reaction to the Gambian government’s criticisms “other than reiterating what Amb. Rice noted in her statement.”

Jeffrey Smith of Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights defended Rice.

“The U.S. statement with which Jammeh took issue outlined a host of human rights concerns, of which abuses against LGBT people in the Gambia was only one,” Smith told the Blade on Monday. “Conveniently, Yahya Jammeh did not address those other ongoing concerns, nor did he attempt to deny their veracity. He knows he can’t.”

Jammeh owns a $3.5 million mansion in the wealthy Montgomery County suburb of Potomac.