After a four-year legal battle with the Tunisian government, the Tunisian association for LGBT rights “Shams” has been legitimated by the Court of Appeal of Tunis on 20 May. “Shams”, which was registered in 2015, was accused by the government of irregularities in the registration process and for being against the ”Islamic values of Tunisian society, which rejects homosexuality and prohibits such extraneous behaviour”. In fact, the main Shams’ battle is to abolish the article 230 of the Tunisian penal code that punishes same-sex relations with three years of imprisonment. The sentence of the Court of Appeals was welcomed by several parts: “It’s encouraging to see a court in Tunisia standing up for freedom of association for all,” said Neela Ghoshal, a HRW researcher.  Also some PM office’s officials welcomed the sentence: Fadel Mafoudh declared that the judgement “once again proves Tunisia is a state that respects the rule of law and that its judiciary is independent from the power of the government”. In the last year, 127 people were imprisoned for same-sex relations in Tunisia and the situation doesn’t get better across the region, considering that only in Jordan, Israel and Bahrain same-sex activity has been decriminalized.