Pink Everest: Nepal Wants Gay Tourists

Nepal wants to paint Mount Everest pink. It wants gay honeymooners trekking through the Himalayas. It wants to host the world's highest same-sex wedding at Everest base camp. All this to attract a chunk of the multi-billion dollar gay tourist market to help pull the country out of poverty. (AP photo)

Just five years ago, police were beating gays and transsexuals in the streets. Now, the issue of gay rights is almost passe here.

Nepal has an openly gay parliamentarian, it is issuing "third gender" identity cards and it appears set to enshrine gay rights - and possibly even same-sex marriage - in a new constitution.

Gay acceptance has become a major marketing opportunity for a country cursed by desperate poverty, but blessed with majestic beauty.(AP photo)

Tourism is one of the main drivers of Nepal's economy, worth about $350 million last year, and government officials are determined to double tourism to 1 million visitors next year.

They hope gay tourists will be far more lucrative than the backpackers who stay in cheap hotels here and travel on shoestring budgets.(AP photo)

Recognising the sensitivity of the matter, the nation wants to ensure that an influx of gay tourists doesn't turn Nepal into a sex tourism destination.(AP photo)

The nation's mountains, food and culture are a natural tourist magnet. Additionally, gay tourists could get married at Everest base camp and honeymoon on an elephant safari.(AP photo)

Nepal also has a huge advantage in appealing to this niche because its neighbours in South Asia - some of them with laws outlawing homosexual sex - are not seen as gay-friendly destinations.

Nepal's own journey into gay acceptance has been a near-revolution, born out of chaos and conflict that decimated the nation's traditional political and social systems.(AP photo)