[UK]
'I always knew I was different' - more rights needed for transgender people
Rona Rees realised from a very young age that there was something different about her.
Rona, from Drefach, who was born Raymond, is one of an estimated 31,000 people in Wales seeking or awaiting gender reassignment surgery.
The 63-year-old said: "I did not know there was a name for it at the start but I knew I was different to the other boys. I didn't know for a number of years what was wrong with me. I put it to one side and just accepted I was odd."

[Jersey/Guernsey]
Jersey: Same-sex marriage bill won’t include ‘spousal veto’ for trans people
Jersey’s planned equal marriage bill will exclude a controversial ‘spousal veto’ clause, which can stop trans people gaining legal gender recognition.

[Ireland]
Drag queen activist tipped to win ‘Person of the Year’ award
An Irish drag queen who made a defiant speech about equality is tipped to pick up a ‘Person of the Year’ award.
Drag artist Panti Bliss, played by Rory O’Neill, caused controversy in January this year when she labelled Catholic lobbying group the Iona Institute ‘homophobes’ on an Irish talk show, over their position on same-sex marriage.

[Iran]
Gay Iranians pressured to surgically change gender, seek asylum
Gay people in Iran know that life in their country can be horrific. They can face execution for being themselves. Those who wish to remain in Iran often receive shocking advice from the medical community. And it involves surgery to change their gender, to be more culturally acceptable.

[India]
167 Indian Trans Women 'Arbitrarily' Jailed, Protestors Demand Justice
The day after Bangalore's pride parade, 167 hijra were detained under an anti-begging law in a move advocates consider a targeted assault against the women's gender identities.

[Malaysia]
‘Wife’ with moustache may become reality if LGBTs are allowed
Selangor Umno delegate Datuk Ismail Kijo expressed his disappointment with the efforts by certain quarters who want the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender) group to be accepted and recognised.

[Cambodia]
‘I know it’s bad for my health, but I want to be a woman’
Faced with discrimination and a lack of resources, the Kingdom’s transgender community are taking matters into their own hands – often at great risk
Rith Rasy fears the large doses of hormones she takes to maintain her feminine figure could cut her life short. But the happiness she gets from living as a woman, the gender with which she’s identified since she was seven years old, is enough for her to justify continuing to take six tablets each day, without any medical guidance. The regime she follows gives her breasts, thin, hairless arms and a more womanly figure. But it has also makes her prone to mood swings and memory loss and diminishes her sex drive.

[Vietnam]
Vietnamese transgender strips off in street to 'show off': official
A Vietnamese woman whose car was pulled over Friday stripped down to her panties only to flaunt her body, a senior police official in the northern province of Bac Giang has said.
Colonel Do Hong Truyen, chief of the provincial traffic police force, on Saturday confirmed the authenticity of the images of the woman in her panties after they went viral on the Internet over the past few days.
(Photo: A photo of the incident in which a Vietnamese transgender woman stripped down to her panties in front of several traffic cops on duty and many passers-by in the northern province of Bac Giang on Friday.)

[Vietnam]
Vietnam transgender teacher dreams of husband, kid
It has been six years since the day Pham Van Hiep, a male educator in the southern Vietnamese province of Binh Phuoc, had a sex reassignment surgery and became Pham Le Quynh Tram, a female teacher.
Tram told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper after teaching a class in District 1, Ho Chi Minh City, one day with an inspiring, charming voice that she is living the happiest days of her life and has both love and passion for career.
(Photo: Pham Le Quynh Tram, a transgender, is shown teaching her students in this file photo.)

[Canada]
Canadian MP: Government ‘trying to kill’ transgender rights bill
Canada’s much-delayed transgender hate crime bill has been stalled yet again, after being bumped off a committee’s agenda.
Transgender bill languishes in Senate after 20 months

[Canada]
University of Calgary approves proposal for on-campus gender-neutral washroom
For most people, walking into a public washroom rarely triggers any fears or anxieties beyond typical concerns of cleanliness or adequate supplies of toilet paper.

[USA]
Some Colleges Revisiting Admission Policies For Transgender Students
Dozens of women's colleges are grappling with the challenge of how to define policies for transgender students. NPR's Eric Westervelt speaks with Wellesly graduate Alex Poon about his experience as a trans-man on campus.

[NY, USA]
Antoinette Thornes Is a Trans Actress Who Rocks
The Thornes singer chats about her role as a woman with a secret in the family drama On a Stool at the End of the Bar.
How honest should a trans person be with his or her partner? That’s one question raised in Robert Callely’s world-premiere drama On a Stool at the End of the Bar, which runs through December 14 at off-Broadway’s 59E59 Theatres. Antoinette Thornes stars as Chris, a woman raising three teenagers in New Jersey with her blue-collar boyfriend of 10 years — a happy suburban family ripped apart by the discovery that Chris is transgender. Thornes, a New York rock singer, discusses the high price of passing.

[WV, USA]
Charleston lawyer stops hiding yearning for life as a woman
The way it happened wasn’t how Anne Kelly planned to come out.
Well, there wasn’t really a plan, but a time was bound to come along that felt right, wasn’t there?
She wanted to be divorced. She wanted to make sure she had answered all of her 9-year-old daughter’s questions. But on the morning of Nov. 3, any plan she might have had changed.
“I had to do it,” she said recently, narrowing her eyes and balling her hand into a fist, recalling that moment.
(Photo by F. Brian Ferguson: Gazette Anne Kelly has been transitioning to a woman for about two years. She recently came out to her friends, who have known her only as Greg Skinner, a 45-year-old man.)

[Peru]
"No me voy a ofender si me dicen Luis o Luisa"
La electa concejal de la comuna de La Esperanza (Trujillo) promete que no solo luchará por la comunidad LGBT, sino por todos los sectores que han visto vulnerados sus derechos. “Todos somos iguales”, señala.

[Argentina]
Polémica por proyectos para sumar trans al municipio
Hay dos propuestas que impulsan que haya un cupo fijo para sumar transexuales a la planta permanente de empleados del Municipio. Qué opina cada bloque.

[Argentina]
Desmintieron que se impulse un subsidio de 8.000 pesos para transexuales porteñas
La autora del proyecto, María Rachid, aseguró que el proyecto para subsidiar a las personas trans de más de cuarenta años fue presentado hace más de un año, y que la suma del subsidio era de $ 2.400.