It was five years ago in Fox prison camp. A group of immigration officers accompanied by a number of interpreters burst in. All of a sudden, one of the officers stood on a chair precisely like a king’s representative in ancient times, like one of those men reading the king’s announcement for convicts. The officer took a piece of paper, and surrounded by dozens of refugees he started to read. The announcement was serious, decisive, to the point and threatening, like his voice. “Homosexuality is illegal in Papua New Guiana and considered as a crime. If anyone in the immigration detention engages in this behaviour, he will be sentenced to 14 years in prison.” It was a dire warning from the prison’s officials and directly targeted homosexual prisoners.

A few months later, Alex, an Iranian gay refugee, stood on the same chair, trembling with rage, and shouted with courage: “I am gay, and this is my sexual identity, I am gay and that’s why I left my country, I announce it loudly and clearly: I am gay.”

Mohamed's life story is a tragedy. But it's typical for fathers held on Manus | Behrouz Boochani Read more

Many people gathered to listen to him. What was the story behind this? What made him speak out? Due to the lack of a private place, Alex and his boyfriend had made love in one of the toilets. When they had left the toilet, they ran into some people who started teasing them. It was the trigger for Alex to get up on the chair and give his short speech.

Alex’s performance was nothing short of a “revolution” in a remote prison in front of dozens of refugee prisoners. He rebelled against a system and a community that suppressed and humiliated his human identity because of his sexual identity. His performance was undoubtedly inspired by the immigration performance, but this one was a revolt against law, against discrimination, against the system and the community, which considered him as “other” and “different”. Alex announced his sexual identity loudly in opposition to a system fundamentally designed to represent him and other refugees as devoid of human identity.

Sign up to receive the latest Australian opinion pieces every weekday

After his performance, Alex was well-known in the prison community made up of hundreds of people. Some began to call him “beautiful Alex”. Eventually, this label spread throughout the whole prison, many people, including some guards and refugees, started addressing him in this way. In other words, his human identity was again presented as less-than while heterosexist presumptions about his identity were thrust upon him, leading him to stand up on a chair and give another speech.

Alex became more socially isolated every day. There is no doubt that many refugees still did respect him and his identity and sympathised with the situation he was stuck in. However, many of these people did not have a chance to directly express their sympathy. From Alex’s point of view, it was the whole community that targeted his existence.

Alex continued to suffer and was becoming more isolated every day

Another problem came up. Toilets, the last refuge for Alex and his boyfriend, were converted into a public place. In practice, he did not have any privacy in the prison any longer. Those who never had to experience being in prison might not be able to contemplate what I mean by lack of privacy. It is hard to imagine how tough it is living under the heavy gaze of a closed community.

After his speeches, I carried out an interview with Alex. He was 30 years old, with a long history of experiencing suppression, ignorance and humiliation. But he liked life itself, he liked living. At first sight, I could sense the pain and suffering that had been inflicted on Alex over the course of his life, due to reactions to his sexual orientation. Yet, he still liked life and knew himself as a warrior, who had been defending his sexual identity for many years, fighting against the conservative, cruel and heterosexist structures of society.

Right at the beginning, he directed our conversation to his adolescence, the time he discovered his sexual identity. Subsequently, he spoke about his family who banished him. He was trying to provide me with a precise picture of the situation that LGBTIQ minorities live with in Iran, and explain how the society and the government suppress them.

Alex opened up about his experiences in Manus prison. He was raped twice. The prison officials, however, completely ignored his complaints. Covering up rapes and sexual harassments has been the policy of the Australian government during these years. The most public incident was when three Wilson security staff from New Zealand and Australia were alleged to have drugged and gang-raped a local female staff member. They were immediately flown off the island and out of PNG; and despite the order of the PNG government and the PNG court, they never returned to justice.

It was an in-depth interview I conducted with Alex, and consequently, his story was published in the Guardian. Back then I had to work as an anonymous source thanks to pressure that immigration had placed on us within the tight security arrangements of the prison.

What did happen after the publication of the report? Evidence was leaked, divulging that a special inspector was assigned by the immigration to find the source contributing to the report on homosexuality in Manus. Revealing stories related to gay, transgender or bisexual men in the prison had always been frightening for the immigration because those stories are like a gateway, disclosing other incidents in the prison and showing more systematic and in-depth issues including rapes and sexual harassments.

Manus Island: lives on hold – photo essay Read more

Alex continued to suffer and was becoming more isolated every day. And as a result of Alex’s experiences other gay refugees did not dare to reveal their sexual identity. It got to the point that if they let others know about their sexual orientation, if they moved in line with Alex, they would face further isolation, targeting and social pressure. In the prison, intentionally designed to destroy the human identity of prisoners, where prisoners are nothing more than numbers living a mechanical existence, revealing that matter would cost them dearly, leading them to further isolation and depression. Over the years only a few gay, transgender or bisexual men have spoken out or made their sexual identity public. Many have been forced into silence.

Alex ultimately returned to Iran as a result of the difficult situation imposed on him, and then escaped Iran again via a different route. Sometimes I imagine how it would be if he had stayed. Another chapter of Manus history would have been written, the history of pain and suffering endured by gay minorities. Alex went back and took a part of the prison’s anguish with him, a scar on his soul.

No one knows how many gay, transgender or bisexual refugees live on Manus, but what is clear is that the suffering they experienced in their countries has been repeated on Manus in a disastrous way. Fear, humiliation, threat, banishment, rape – these are all concepts and experiences lived daily by these men. Gay, transgender and bisexual men here have experienced even greater torment than other refugees. Alex was a revolutionary symbol for the gay, transgender and bisexual men on Manus. His was a revolution against the kyriarchal system, a revolution against the extremely conservative community, a revolution that seems to have ended in resounding defeat.

• Behrouz Boochani is a journalist and an Iranian refugee held on Manus Island. Translated by Moones Mansoubi